Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[MADAM SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — EMPLOYMENT

Job Clubs

Mr. Sumberg: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what representations she has received in connection with the function of job clubs; and if she will make a statement.

The Secretary of State for Employment (Mrs. Gillian Shephard): Job clubs have been a great success. I have received many representations asking that we provide more places and we shall.

Mr. Sumberg: I warmly welcome my right hon. Friend's answer, but does not it sit uneasily with the fact the professional and executive job club in my constituency has recently closed? Is she aware that the alternatives provided are very unsatisfactory? Could she examine the situation and find out whether we can make some improvement?

Mrs. Shephard: I am aware of my hon. Friend's concern about our new arrangements to replace the Prestwich executive job club. I was glad that he and his constituents found it so helpful and I am sure that he will welcome the fact that, in view of our plan to provide an extra 75,000 places from April, we shall certainly take the opportunity to review arrangements in Prestwich.

Ms. Eagle: How useful can job clubs be, when unemployment in Wallasey is now 5,964 and at the last count there were only 75 vacancies?

Mrs. Shephard: Perhaps I could explain to the hon. Lady that the job clubs' record is first class. Nearly 50 per cent. of people who leave them go into work and a further 15 per cent. go into training, self-employment or full-time further education. Two thirds of unemployed people leave the register within six months. The 1.5 million opportunities that we have made available help all unemployed people to improve their prospects of finding work at what is undoubtedly a difficult time.

Mr. Evennett: Is my right hon. Friend aware that our job club at the college of technology in Erith is very popular and is widely used by the local community? Does she agree that we should encourage more such clubs, because they give unemployed people tremendous opportunities for companionship and advice and to get into real employment in the near future?

Mrs. Shephard: As I said, job clubs are effective in helping unemployed people to find work. I am glad to say that, from April, very nearly 300,000 places will be provided.

Youth Training

Mr. Nigel Jones: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what steps she is taking to improve the training opportunities for the young unemployed; and if she will make a statement.

Mrs. Gillian Shephard: I shall be extending the use of credits, which will give more and more young people greater opportunities to gain the skills that they and employers need for the 1990s.

Mr. Jones: I am grateful for that answer. Does the Minister share the concern of many of my constituents, who think that rising youth unemployment is one of the main reasons for the rocketing crime figures? Why do not the Government increase substantially the amount of money that they spend on youth unemployment, in a week when employment figures throughout Britain will reach 3 million?

Mrs. Shephard: Due to the larger numbers of young people staying on at school we have a large amount of resources to spend on youth training. All training and enterprise councils have the resources to meet the guarantee and I have left them in no doubt that that is what they are expected to do.

Mr. Patrick Thompson: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that it is the Government's stated policy and intention that every young person over the age of 16 should be in either education or full-time training, unless they have a job? Will she do what she can to improve the way in which information is gathered for statistics involving young people who are seeking jobs or who are in training? Finally, will she confirm that, under the Government, about 250,000 young people are undergoing training, compared with only 7,000 under the Labour Government in 1979?

Mrs. Shephard: About 291,000 young people are training under youth training and currently, of those, more than three quarters find jobs or go on to further education. There was a problem with the exchange of information between careers services, training providers and TECs in the summer, which was why I announced then the improved arrangements. I am continuing to monitor them closely.

Mr. Tony Lloyd: Is the Secretary of State aware that if we were to use the same definition for the young unemployed as the Conservative party uses for the Young Conservatives, everyone who is out of work would be included in that category?
On a serious note, there are now more than 900,000 people aged between 16 and 24 who are out of work. That is not the lost generation, but the abandoned generation. It has been abandoned by a Government who have no policies and no compassion. The Secretary of State recently rightly talked about the abolition of the 21-hour rule. Will she ensure that every young person between 16


and 24 has the right to go into either full-time education and training or part-time education and training and still draw benefit?

Mrs. Shephard: As the hon. Gentleman knows, unemployment is not an option for young people aged between 16 and 17. They either remain in full-time education—there has been a welcome 25 per cent. Increase in the numbers going into further education—find a job, or take up a guaranteed youth training place. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will also welcome the fact that large numbers of 18 to 21-year-olds are going into higher education and provision has been made for them. On the issue of benefit eligibility, I can only repeat what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said at Question Time a couple of weeks ago—that a wide range of options is being considered to help unemployed people to use their time productively. I shall make an announcement in a few weeks' time.

Mr. Lester: When my right hon. Friend is considering that wide range of options, will she blow the dust off the original community programme that we had in 1980? It was a successful programme as a follow-on to training, particularly for young poeple, and it had a good record of placing people in jobs. We should not rewrite the book when we already have a good book on the shelf.

Mrs. Shephard: I know of my hon. Friend's great interest in the matter. A large number of elements of the old community programme have been retained in employment action. My hon. Friend is right to draw to the attention of the House the excellence of many features of that programme, which is one of the options that we are currently considering.

Labour Statistics

Mr. Etherington: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many people are currently unemployed in the north of England.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Patrick McLoughlin): In December 1992, on the seasonally adjusted basis, there were 168,500 unemployed claimants in the northern region.

Mr. Etherington: One of the few areas of expansion that the Government have achieved since 1979 has been unemployment and my constituency has had more than its fair share of that commodity. Last week a Minister said that the way to rebuild the economy in this country was to ensure that we had a well-trained and well-educated work force. In view of that, does the Minister agree that the last thing that we require is a tax on knowledge? If he agrees, will he speak to his colleagues and ensure that no value added tax is placed on books, periodicals and newspapers?

Mr. McLoughlin: I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman would say that, in July 1986, unemployment in his constituency was 10,991 and that it is now 6,812—a reduction of 38 per cent. I should have thought that even he might welcome that, but perhaps I was hoping for far too much. The question of which issues will be included in the Budget is one for my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Mr. Bates: Is my hon. Friend aware of the significant inward investment that has been made in the north-east? Is

he aware of the £2.7 billion of inward investment and the 35,000 jobs that it has either created or safeguarded? Does he agree that that has been achieved because organisations such as the Northern Development Company, Tyne and Wear development corporation and the Teesside development corporation—all Government sponsored—have gone round the world promoting the considerable benefits of locating in the north-east, not perpetually running down the north-east, as the Labour party does?

Mr. McLoughlin: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. He is right to draw attention to inward investment, which has been very important to the north-east and the northern region. Inward investment is indeed welcome and has certainly not been described by the Government as "alien" —as it was described not so long ago by the Trades Union Congress. My hon. Friend is right: inward investment has provided many jobs and is very welcome.

Mr. Dobson: Will the Minister confirm that there are now 200,000 fewer jobs in the northern region than there were in 1979? Will he take the advice of all who watch him and his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on television and listen to them on the radio? Will they cut the cackle, stop waffling and actually create some jobs?

Mr. McLoughlin: If anyone has been responsible for waffle, it is Opposition Members rather than us.
The simple truth is that, in the northern region—which the question concerns–220,000 people were unemployed in July 1986. Today, the figure is 168,000. I should have thought that even the hon. Gentleman would welcome a reduction of 24 per cent.

Mr. John Greenway: May I remind my hon. Friend that any geographical description of the north of England must include Yorkshire and Humberside? Does he agree that, in Yorkshire and the rest of the northern region, entrepreneurs and others who wish to set up businesses will find a good quality of life, local authorities that are prepared to help them with planning and a willing work force second to none in the United Kingdom?

Mr. McLoughlin: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I am sure that he is absolutely right.

Wages

Mr. Chisholm: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is the average weekly wage for (a) men and (b) women.

The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. Michael Forsyth): The figures are £346.70 and £247.10. respectively.

Mr. Chisholm: That is appalling as it stands, but will the Minister tell us whether it includes workers below the national insurance threshold? Will he also tell us—given that a major factor in the gender gap is the concentration of women in low-paid employment—why the Government are deliberately widening that gap by abolishing wages councils? Is not it time that they did something to help low-paid women by extending the power and scope of wages councils, strengthening the Equal Pay Act 1970 and providing more child care facilities to which such women can have access?

Mr. Forsyth: I note the hon. Gentleman's opposition to the abolition of wages councils. I am not sure that he was a leading opponent of their abolition when the Labour Government abolished 11 of them.
The hon. Gentleman might like to know that average female earnings rose by 48 per cent. in real terms between 1979 and 1992. That is three times the rate of growth under Labour.

Mr. Bill Walker: Will my hon. Friend confirm that it is important to be price-competitive when recession and unemployment are increasing everywhere? We certainly do not want to price ourselves out of jobs—especially in my hon. Friend's constituency and mine, where the tourist industry is a big employer.

Mr. Forsyth: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. He is right to point out that wages councils destroy jobs. If we were to adopt the Opposition's policy and opt for some form of minimum wage, instead of having the highest proportion of the female work force in employment, we might find ourselves in the same position as Spain, where nearly a quarter of the female population is out of work. Spain is one of the two countries in Europe with a statutory national minimum wage.

Ms. Quin: Will the Minister confirm that the gap between men's and women's wages is far less in the sectors covered by wages councils than it is in other sectors? Is not that a strong argument for retaining wages councils, rather than abolishing them?
Will the Minister also comment on the scandalous position of young workers who were taken out of wages councils by the Government and whose wages are now very low? My local job centre, for instance, is advertising a job for an apprentice hairdresser aged between 16 and 20. The pay is £35–60 for a 38-hour week—in other words, 93p an hour. Can the Government describe that as a decent wage for a week's work?

Mr. Forsyth: It was precisely that attitude which was responsible for the destruction of so many apprenticeships in this country. It seems that the hon. Lady would like to have people with no jobs and no apprenticeships in return for having a national minimum wage. I should be much more impressed by the hon. Lady and the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson), who is so vocal on the Opposition Front Bench about the abolition of wages councils, if they were to tell the House that after this House has abolished wages councils a future Labour Government would bring them back. The hon. Lady has consistently refused to do so because she recognises that wages councils are an anachronism which cover a mere 10 per cent. of the work force.

Social Chapter

Mr. Butler: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what current proposals the European Commission has to introduce, under other treaty provisions, measures within the scope of the social chapter.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: It is for the European Commission to decide what proposals it brings forward under the treaty or under the Maastricht agreement of Eleven on social policy.

Mr. Butler: May I reassure the excellent employers of Milton Keynes that the Secretary of State's fight against the working hours directive will continue and that no parts of the social chapter will be brought in under the guise of health and safety directives without a continued fight from the Government? Does my hon. Friend agree, as the employers in my constituency do, that Britain is, as Jacques Delors says, a paradise for foreign investment as a result of this Government's policies?

Mr. Forsyth: It is certainly true that Britain gets something like 40 per cent. of the inward investment coming into the European Community. My hon. Friend is right to point to the job-destroying effects of the social chapter measures. I was struck by the fact that the non-wage costs of employing Hoover workers in Dijon is five times the cost of employing the same workers in Cambuslang.

Mr. Galbraith: Does the Minister agree that the problem is not just about the legislation that is about to come from Europe? It is about the legislation which we already have but which has not yet been implemented by the Government—in particular, the acquired rights directive. Will the Minister confirm that the acquired rights directive applies to compulsory competitive tendering, that it has always applied to compulsory competitive tendering and that those individuals who have been disadvantaged by the Government's not applying it in the past can now seek compensation? When will the Government publicise those facts so that workers can obtain their democratic rights?

Mr. Forsyth: The question whether the acquired rights directive applies will depend upon each contract and the circumstances pertaining to it. If an undertaking has been transferred, the terms of the acquired rights directive will apply. For the hon. Gentleman to describe British workers as being denied rights because Britain refuses to have any part of the social chapter is nonsense. The fact is that British workers have the right to determine the terms and conditions of their employment alongside their employers. By transferring the right to decide that outside Britain, British workers are losing rights, not having their rights enhanced.

Mr. Rowe: Will my hon. Friend confirm that whatever the European Commission happens to bring forward, it is the Council of Ministers which makes the final decision on what should be accepted? Does my hon. Friend agree that if only we could make progress towards ratification of the Maastricht treaty, we could set about altering the institutions of the European Community and bringing them more into line with what the British Government would prefer?

Mr. Forsyth: My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the fact that these matters are ultimately decided by the Council of Ministers, although the point to which I think he drew attention was that matters were being brought forward under health and safety provisions which were determined on a majority vote—like working time, which would be damaging to jobs in this country. The Government will continue to fight those measures because we wish to have no part in making the European Community or Britain less competitive and putting more people on the dole as a result.

Official Entertainment

Mr. Tony Banks: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how much was spent on official entertainment in her Department in the last financial year.

Mr. McLoughlin: In 1991–22, the amounts spent by the Employment Department, ACAS, the Health and Safety Executive, the Health and Safety Commission the Employment Service and the Office of Manpower Economics were £43,281, £6,927, £13,635, £23,500 and £7,858 respectively. This represents three thousandths of 1 per cent. of the Department's budget.

Mr. Banks: The Minister is not going to get away so easily with that answer. I can well understand a modest amount being spent on entertainment, but for his Department to spend that sort of money in 1992–23 and the year before when unemployment has risen every month is an absurdity. What is this year's budget to be spent on—champagne to celebrate unemployment reaching 3 million on Thursday, on pâte de foie gras being stuffed down the throats of employers because Britain is being turned into a sweatshop, or shall we be drinking highballs to celebrate the opt-out from the social charter? The Government have no right to spend taxpayers' money on wassailing in the Department of Employment while the unemployed have nothing to celebrate.

Mr. McLoughlin: It seems that the only people who will be drinking champagne to celebrate 3 million people being unemployed are the Opposition. They have offered no constructive messages and have opposed every training scheme that we have introduced. We shall accept no strictures from the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks), as the one thing that I have been unable to find out is the amount of money spent on entertainment by the Greater London council.

Mr. Dickens: Does my hon. Friend agree that the amount of money spent on entertaining which he announced this afternoon is petty cash compared with the Department's budget? If that money enables our officers and Ministers to tell people that we have low inflation, low taxation, low interest rates and sensible trade union legislation which will attract jobs into this country, is not it just petty cash and was not it stupid to ask that question?

Mr. McLoughlin: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I assure him that any money spent by the Department on such matters is very closely monitored.

Commercial Vehicle Industry

Mr. Hoyle: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what was the number of people employed in the commercial vehicle industry at the end of 1992.

Mrs. Gillian Shephard: There are no separate estimates for the commercial vehicle industry.

Mr. Hoyle: Is the Secretary of State aware that the numbers in the industry will be diminished if the Government do not assist Leyland DAF? Will she ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry to get off his backside, stop his inactivity and begin to intervene on behalf of the leading truck maker, as the Belgian and Dutch Governments are doing?

Mrs. Shephard: My right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade made it clear in the House that the receivers believe that at least part of the United Kingdom operations can be saved as a commercially viable business without state handouts. He also made it clear that we cannot repeat the open-ended taxpayers' commitments of the British Leyland years. He also said that if proposals are made to the Government for help with specific projects, we are prepared to consider them on their own merits, provided, of course, that they are within EC rules and the usual criteria under the industrial development legislation.

Mr. Dover: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that it is her Department, through the redundancy fund, which has paid the money to the ex-workers of Leyland DAF? Therefore, have not the Government already helped the commercial vehicle workers?

Mrs. Shephard: We made rapid arrangements to pay statutory redundancy payments. It is also true that Employment Service and training and enterprise council staff are ready to go to plants deal with claims and offer advice.

Mr. Robert Ainsworth: Does the Secretary of State agree that redundancy payments from her Department are the last kind of assistance that British workers want from the Government? Does she realise that three and a half jobs for every direct job are at risk as a result of the Leyland DAF crisis? Does she accept that there is a serious discrepancy between what the President of the Board of Trade said about approaches that have been made and what is being said by representatives of the company? Will she make representations for more active involvement by the DTI to save the jobs involved?

Mrs. Shephard: I made clear my Department's intention to give every possible assistance to workers affected in that way, and I repeat that the receivers believe that at least part of the United Kingdom operations can be saved. Staff and Ministers of the Department of Trade and Industry have stood ready to give help if required and I can do no more than repeat what I just said to the hon. Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Ainsworth).

Mr. Madel: Does my right hon. Friend agree that European Governments should redouble their efforts to deal with the problem of over-capacity in the commercial vehicle industry in Europe? To that end, should not particular help be given to long-serving truck workers who lost their jobs in 1992?

Mrs. Shephard: I know that my hon. Friend has a constituency interest in the matter. He is right to pinpoint as the problem the over-capacity of truck production. Nevertheless, the Government hope that some help can be given and that something can be salvaged from the current problems of Leyland DAF?

Labour Statistics

Mr. Campbell-Savours: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what proposals she has for reducing unemployment in west Cumbria.

Mr. McLoughlin: The Employment Service and training and enterprise councils deliver a wide range of employment, enterprise and training programmes to help unemployed people in west Cumbria, as elsewhere.

Mr. Campbell-Savours: Has the Minister noted the framing of my question, No. 8 on the Order Paper, which asks what proposals the Secretary of State has for reducing unemployment in west Cumbria? May I have an answer to my question? What proposals do the Government have for reducing unemployment in an area where there is no prospect of new industry coming in? Young people in my constituency, who asked me to table the question about their future prospects, want an answer. What proposals do the Government have?

Mr. McLoughlin: The Government have consistently made it clear that it is our intention to provide the right economic climate so that job and employment opportunities will be available to people. Bearing in mind all the Government's investment in west Cumbria—the Trident programme and the development of Sellafield—it is strange that the hon. Gentleman should have the cheek to ask such a question.

Protective Headgear

Mr. Madden: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what representations she has received calling for action to ensure that Sikhs living in the United Kingdom and throughout the EC are exempted for religious reasons from requirements to wear protective headgear in appropriate workplaces.

Mr. McLoughlin: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has received a number of representations on the matter. I have met various hon. Members to discuss the matter, including my hon. Friends the Members for Hayes and Harlington (Mr. Dicks) and for Slough (Mr. Watts) and the hon. Member for Leicester, East (Mr. Vaz).

Mr. Madden: Why are the Minister and his Secretary of State so reluctant to stand up for the religious beliefs of Sikhs in the United Kingdom and throughout the EC? Why has the Minister's Department failed to consult the Home Office on the race relations aspects of the matter? When will he seek some convenient legal advice from the Attorney-General in order to find a way in which to exempt Sikhs from the daft requirement to remove their turbans in order to wear protective head gear?

Mr. McLoughlin: While the directive was being negotiated, the United Kingdom issued a unilateral minute stating that the provisions of article 6 of the directive
are not intended to result in requirements which are incompatible with the beliefs and practices of religious groups in member states.
That was our position, but it was rejected by the other member states.

Mr. John Marshall: Does my hon. Friend believe that more or fewer Sikhs would be at work if we were to introduce a national minimum wage and sign the social chapter? Do those who advocate that course of action not want the unemployment of more Sikhs?

Mr. McLoughlin: I am grateful to my hon. Friend who is, of course, right. Such practices, which the Opposition would have imposed on the United Kingdom, would severely restrict employment opportunities generally throughout the United Kingdom.

Mr. Khabra: I endorse the views expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden). I

have raised the question with the Leader of the House in early-day motion 1251 in my name and those of hon. Friends. I come from the same community. I know that the directive will be an attack on the Sikh religion. This Government can ignore the EC directive. They have done so in the past whenever it suited them. I am sure that this Government—[Interruption.]

Madam Speaker: Order. There are occasions when the House has to be a little tolerant. This happens to be one of them. I am sure that the hon. Member will now put a direct question, having made his comment.

Mr. Khabra: I ask the Minister to ignore the EC directive, since the Government can disregard and ignore the views of the House on a matter important to the nations concerned, such as the Maastricht treaty. They could ignore this directive and grant a concession to the Sikhs as they granted a concession to the Sikhs in the construction industry.

Mr. McLoughlin: I do understand the point that the hon. Gentleman is making on this. At the meetings I have held with leaders of the Sikh community, with hon. Friends and a Labour hon. Member, these points have been put to me. We tried to secure a derogation from the directive and that failed in 1989. There is no reason to suppose that a new approach would be more successful, especially as the directive has now come into force. I recognise the point that the hon. Member makes and I know that my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council replied to his question after the statement on business.

Mr. Watts: None the less, can further approaches be made to the Commission to seek a derogation from the offensive provisions of this directive?

Mr. McLoughlin: I am grateful for the question, but we did try to get a derogation at the time of the negotiations in 1989. That failed, but I am willing to consider very strong representations that have been made to me by my hon. Friends and by Labour hon. Members, but I cannot say that that will be successful, at the end of the day.

Labour Statistics

Mr. Hain: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if she will give the latest figures for adult male unemployment in (a) the United Kingdom, (b) Wales, (c) the valleys programme area and (d) Neath.

Mrs. Gillian Shephard: The unadjusted rates are 14.2 per cent.,14.2 per cent., 19.6 per cent. and 13 per cent. respectively.

Mr. Hain: The Secretary of State has confirmed that one in five adult males is unemployed in the south Wales valleys area, That is a disgraceful figure. When added to the one in five who are economically inactive, that means that four in 10 people are seeking work or wish to work in the south Wales valleys area. When will the Secretary of State stop mouthing fine words and coming up with seminars and gimmicks, and when will she do her job of creating employment in this country by carrying out a programme of investment—not gimmicks, schemes and other words of sympathy?

Mrs. Shephard: I share the hon. Gentleman's concern for all people facing unemployment, but he surely welcomes the fact that unemployment in Neath, his constituency, has fallen in the past 12 months. He must be delighted, too, that unemployment is lower in Wales than in some regions of England and that that is due in no small part to a highly successful programme of inward investment which last year brought 17,000 jobs to Wales with capital expenditure of more than £1 billion. The hon. Gentleman asks about action; that is action, but it has been welcomed by him and his comrades in the TUC as alien action.

Mr. Richards: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Wales has attracted inward investment by more than 1,000 companies since 1981 creating tens of thousands of jobs? Does she agree that if the Labour party were to have its way with the social chapter that inward investment would dry up?

Mrs. Shephard: There is no question about it. Indeed, if Opposition Members were to have their way with many of the other lunatic policies that they wish to pursue—for example, punitive taxation of successful companies, levies and burdens on business, support for the social chapter and for the national minimum wage—it would discourage inward investment and hence the creation of jobs.

Mr. Dobson: Can the right hon. Lady confirm that the figures that she has just given for the United Kingdom show that we now lose no fewer than 15 million working days every week because of unemployment? Does she agree that it is the economics of the madhouse for Britain to attempt to do without the products, goods and services of the people that her Government have thrown out of work? Is it not time that, instead of just expressing her concern and coming up with fiddled figures, she did something about getting people in this country back to work? They want real jobs, and when they are at work they want to be paid well enough to be able to bring up their families.

Mrs. Shephard: Earlier the hon. Gentleman exhorted us to cut the cackle, which is pretty rich coming from someone who has raised blustering to an art form. He is quite right when he says that what people want is real jobs, and real jobs can come only from the pursuit of low inflation, low interest rates and low burdens on businesses —exactly the reverse of all the policies pursued and supported by Opposition Members.

Mr. Jenkin: May I emphasise to my right hon. Friend that we recall how we created jobs in the 1980s by maintaining a low taxation, low interest rate and high incentive economy? I draw her attention to the unemployment record in France, which has been linked by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development directly to the application of minimum wage legislation, which demonstrably destroys jobs.

Mrs. Shephard: It is indeed the case that the experience of France in terms of job creation was in direct contrast to our own during the 1980s, when our supply-side measures were described as impressive by the OECD.

Mr. Wigley: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is her latest estimate of unemployment among persons aged under 21 years.

Mr. McLoughlin: Claimant unemployment figures by age are produced quarterly and for specific age bands only. On the unadjusted basis, there were 243,928 claimant unemployed people aged under 20 in the United Kingdom in October 1992.

Mr. Wigley: Is the Minister aware of the disastrously high level of youth unemployment in many parts of Wales and elsewhere? Is he aware that for those leaving youth training schemes the unemployment level in Wales has increased from 15.9 per cent. in 1990 to over 26 per cent? Is this not a totally unacceptable level? In these circumstances, why on earth do the Government cut back the money available to the training and enterprise councils, as they have with the West Wales TEC, where they have cut back £800,000, when the money is desperately needed to give training opportunities to young people?

Mr. McLoughlin: What the hon. Gentleman is saying is that 74 per cent. of those who go on youth training schemes manage to find jobs when they finish their course. I should have thought that he would welcome that. My right hon. Friend has made it perfectly clear that we stand by the guarantee to all people in that age bracket, and if for any reason any TEC cannot meet that guarantee, we are willing to consider whether extra resources can be made available to it.

Mr. Riddick: Does my hon. Friend accept that we on the Conservative Benches fully understand the terrible difficulties that unemployment brings for individuals and their families? Does my hon. Friend agree that a system of workfare, particularly for young people, is worthy of consideration? Not only would it ensure that certain useful environmentally friendly jobs were carried out; it would also give those young people an opportunity to have contact with the world of work.

Mr. McLoughlin: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who will acknowledge the change that we have made already whereby young people will not have the opportunity of claiming benefit without going through training or further education. With regard to workfare, I can only say that we are looking at a number of schemes that have been put to us.

Mr. Barry Jones: Does the Minister know that some of our biggest companies are closing their apprentice training schools? Does he know that this is particularly the case in steel, textiles and aerospace? What will the Government do about this serious development, which will prove to be the route to industrial suicide unless they do something about it?

Mr. McLoughlin: My right hon. Friend mentioned the damage that had been done to the apprenticeship scheme, and the way in which many trade unions tried to pursue larger wage increases. We are determined to ensure there is proper training and look forward to a change and to reversing the policy of the Opposition so that they start supporting training schemes we have taken forward.

Mr. Tredinnick: Does my hon. Friend agree that as far as workfare is concerned, there are already schemes in place that assist those who are unemployed and that it would be better to look at a scheme such as this as an


additional resource for the unemployed? Might not there be competition for such a scheme because of the additional resources that will be provided?

Mr. McLoughlin: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. A number of schemes are available, such as employment action, which has been very successful and useful in the community.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRIME MINISTER

Engagements

Mr. Worthington: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 February.

The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

Mr. Worthington: In 1979, just over 1 million people were unemployed. At the same time, just over 7 million people were employed in manufacturing industry—seven people in manufacturing jobs for every single person unemployed. Now, measuring unemployment in the same way, there are 4.25 million unemployed. On Thursday this week—[Interruption.]

Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman has been in the House for some time. He knows that he must put a direct question.

Mr. Worthington: In the past 14 years, 3 million manufacturing jobs have been destroyed. Did the Prime Minister intend to do that, or was it someone else's fault?

The Prime Minister: Let me say to the hon. Gentleman that
the threat of recession and the reality of rising unemployment is spreading throughout the European continent
—not my words but those of the Leader of the Opposition. I would find the hon. Gentleman's concern more convincing if he had one decent economic policy to tackle unemployment, but he has not.

Mr. Wells: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Nissan factory in Sunderland has been declared by its Japanese owners to be the most efficient factory in the world? Is he further aware that should this House be foolish enough to include the socialist charter in the Maastricht treaty, Japanese inward investment would be seriously discouraged?

The Prime Minister: I was not aware of the specific point made by my hon. Friend, but I was aware that Nissan is exporting cars from Sunderland back to Japan. I offer my congratulations to the management and work force on that achievement. There is no doubt that the social chapter and similar policies would damage the prospect of such success stories in future. That is why we opposed it at Maastricht and why we oppose it now.

Mr. John Smith: Does the Prime Minister accept that the House should be able to decide whether Britain should accept or reject the social chapter of the Maastricht treaty?

The Prime Minister: It is for this House to decide by its vote on Third Reading whether to approve the European Communities (Amendment) Bill and enable the

Government to ratify the treaty. There is no question of our ratifying the treaty except through the normal parliamentary procedures. Individual amendments to the Bill will be debated in Committee in the usual way as for others.

Mr. John Smith: Bearing in mind that the Government announced their latest interpretation of the law only yesterday, and as other amendments apart from amendment No. 27 have been ruled out of order, is not it a curious coincidence that the prospect of political defeat causes a revision of the legal opinion? Why are the Government so anxious to prevent the House from deciding this issue?

The Prime Minister: There are two sorts of amendments that we have to deal with in the Bill. There are those that would render our law incompatible with the treaty and which must be defeated, and others that are undesirable but which would not prevent us from ratifying the treaty. The Committee will come to those, issue by issue.

Mr. John Smith: Has the Prime Minister no sense of shame? Today, he was described in The Times as being like a
spiv business man employing a sharp lawyer".
—[Interruption.]

Madam Speaker: Order.

Mr. Smith: Why is the Prime Minister so determined to use every slippery manoeuvre to avoid Parliament deciding this issue? Is he not engaged in an outright abuse of our unwritten constitution?

Mr. Skinner: Vote against Third Reading and we'll show them. [Interruption.]

The Prime Minister: Occasionally, it might be a novelty to see the hon. Gentleman in the same Lobby as his right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith). Sharp lawyers in glass houses should not throw stones in the way in which the right hon. and learned Gentleman has. The Government are explaining to the House what the true effect of an incompetent Opposition amendment would be.
The right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East claims repeatedly to support the Maastricht treaty, but he and his hon. Friends tabled an amendment which was intended to lead to amendments to the treaty, a new intergovernmental conference and new ratification procedures in the member states. Opposition Members were prepared to put at risk the future not just of the Bill but of the entire treaty. That is the right hon. and learned Gentleman who accuses us of sharp practice when he claims to support the Bill.

Mr. Booth: Would the Prime Minister express the feelings of the whole House by praising the fine British achievement in the Antarctic by Sir Ranulph Fiennes and Dr. Stroud? Does he consider that that is an example of volunteering for a good cause which he was advocating earlier this year?

The Prime Minister: I am happy to offer my congratulations and those of the House to Sir Ranulph. It shows that if one keeps going one will get to one's objective.

Rev. Martin Smyth: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.

Mr. Smyth: Could the Prime Minister, in his meeting with President Clinton, assure him of our good wishes but at the same time urge him to resist moves to appoint a peace envoy for Northern Ireland since those who advocate it are partisan in their opinion?
Does the Prime Minister accept that the best way to promote peace in Northern Ireland is the continued curtailment of funds and support for terrorism with an intensive education course for United States citizens, especially those of Irish republican sympathies, to enable them to understand that Northern Ireland is not a colony but part of the United Kingdom by choice of its citizens?

The Prime Minister: There has been a considerable effort by the United States Government and a number of leading American politicians to curb the flow of funds from the United States and to co-operate with us in bringing terrorist criminals to justice. I welcome that very much.
I hope and expect the new American Administration to continue to support the political dialogue established over the past two years. I believe that it offers the best hope of reconciliation and is fully consistent with Northern Ireland's position, as the hon. Member said, as a part of the United Kingdom.

Mr. Paice: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

Mr. Paice: My right hon. Friend will recall that the last time that inflation was 1.7 per cent. he was just 25 years old and I was even younger. He will also recall that the then Labour Chancellor stated that inflation was the mother and father of unemployment. Is it not the case that with low inflation, low interest rates, low taxation and high productivity, Britain is best placed to recover from the recession ahead of all the other countries in Europe?

The Prime Minister: I agree with my hon. Friend except in one respect; I believe that I was 24 at the time and not 25. But the fall in inflation in January was excellent news in terms of both the retail prices index and the underlying rate of inflation. It provides the best possible basis for recovery in output and employment. We now have the lowest inflation rate for a quarter of a century and a rate below that of our colleagues in the Community and below the G7 averages. We have the lowest interest rates in the Community. We have mortgage rates at their lowest since 1956 and external surveys show that the United Kingdom will be among the fastest growing economies in Europe both this year and next year.

United Nations

Mr. Cryer: To ask the Prime Minister when he next expects to pay an official visit to the United Nations.

The Prime Minister: I have no plans to visit the United Nations headquarters in New York in the near future.

Mr. Cryer: Does the Prime Minister accept that the Government's support of the United Nations is highly selective and that there is absolutely no case for the Government continuing to breach the United Nations nuclear non-proliferation treaty by the manufacture and deployment of Trident nuclear weapons of mass destruction?

Mr. Gallie: What about Rosyth?

Mr. Cryer: Does the Prime Minister endorse and support—

Mr. Gallie: What about Rosyth?

Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman had better contain himself.

Mr. Cryer: Does the Prime Minister endorse and support the 150 members of the United Nations who have by treaty and declaration refused to manufacture and deploy nuclear weapons? If he supports those 150 nations and their moral superiority, why does he not follow them? Does he support them, yes or no?

The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend the Member for Ayr (Mr. Gallie) drew attention to some of the inconsistencies in the hon. Gentleman's question. The replacement of Polaris in the mid-1990s is essential for Britain to maintain an effective and credible deterrent into the next century. There is nothing in the non-proliferation treaty to prevent a nuclear weapons state from maintaining the credibility and effectiveness of a minimum deterrent in this way. That is the position in law and it is our position in policy.

Engagements

Mr. Patrick Thompson: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

Mr.Cryer: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. In view of that unsatisfactory and misleading answer, I reserve the right to raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman may raise the matter again, but he had better withdraw the word "misleading".

Mr. Cryer: rose—

Madam Speaker: Order. I assure the hon. Gentleman that I heard the word. I am sure that he will rephrase it for me.

Mr. Cryer: I will withdraw the word "misleading" and say that he was economical with the truth.

Madam Speaker: Mr. Patrick Thompson.

Mr. Thompson: Is my right hon. Friend aware of representations from the police and local crime prevention panels, including the panel in Norwich, about the increased number of serious crimes committed by young people, some out on bail? Some individuals commit literally hundreds of offences. Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that the Government are determined to tackle that horrendous problem?

The Prime Minister: I will offer that assurance to my hon. Friend. There is a small hard core of persistent young offenders who are responsible for a disproportionate amount of crime, most notably property crime, especially car theft. In the past society has sometimes perhaps been too quick to understand and too slow to condemn. I doubt whether that helps the young people concerned. It is time to crack down on those young offenders. My right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary will shortly make proposals to do just that.

Dr. Reid: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.

Dr. Reid: With reference to the Prime Minister's earlier answer on the question of Maastricht, may I inform him that this morning I had the pleasure of showing round the House of Commons a group of pupils from Brannock high school in my constituency? Having spoken of 1,000 years of Parliament and several hundred years of parliamentary

sovereignty, I was asked a simple question by one of the pupils: "But what good is Parliament if the Prime Minister can ignore it when he chooses?" How would the Prime Minister have responded to that question?

The Prime Minister: He would have said, "I can't, and I don't."

Mr. Hawkins: Will my right hon. Friend accept the congratulations of literally thousands of my constituents who work at British Aerospace on the Tornado line for the work that he did in personally securing the contract? Will he further accept that my constituents know that they have him and the Conservative party to thank for securing their future in the defence industry and the future of their families? Unlike the Labour party, which whinges and whines, my right hon. Friend goes out and gets jobs for Britain.

The Prime Minister: I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for that endorsement. The Tornado is undoubtedly a fine aircraft and I hope that we shall be able to export many more.

National Health Service (London)

The Secretary of State for Health (Mrs. Virginia Bottomley): With permission, Madam Speaker, I should like to make a statement about our proposals for improving the national health service in London. [Interruption.]

Madam Speaker: Order. Hon. Members who are leaving the Chamber should do so quietly and quickly. We are about to hear an important statement.

Mrs. Bottomley: I begin by expressing my sincere thanks to Sir Bernard Tomlinson, whose report has been instrumental in carrying the debate forward.
Following the publication of the Tomlinson report, we undertook an extensive period of informal consultation with the institutions and professional groups involved. I pay warm tribute to my hon. Friend the Minister for Health for the thorough way in which he held those discussions.
London and the rest of the country are poorly served by the present pattern of health services in the capital. Despite the fact that we spend some 20 per cent. more per head in London than elsewhere, services are often ill matched to the day-to-day needs of those who live and work there. London has 43 major acute hospitals, twice as many consultants per head as elsewhere, and, for example, 14 centres of specialist cardiac services and 13 in neurosurgery.
Despite the panoply of provision, patients use accident and emergency departments rather than going to a GP; patients cannot be discharged from hospital because there are inadequate services outside hospital to care for them; primary health care services in the rest of the country are often well ahead of the care that is available inside London. This is an unacceptable imbalance. It has to be redressed. The issues are well known. They are well documented and well understood. They have been the subject of at least 20 reports in the last 100 years. For a variety of reasons, successive Governments have declined to grasp the nettle. Today we are making a decisive break with that tradition.
Patients from outside London prefer to be treated locally. This process will accelerate, and not decline, in the future. Modern medicine means also that we can treat more patients with fewer beds. Many more services can be provided outside hospital, as the pioneering advances of the GP fund holders have shown. London should be in the vanguard of change.
Our response is rooted in the principles of our health service reforms. We start from the unshakeable belief that in London, as elsewhere, it is the patient who must come first. How and where services are provided should be determined first and foremost by what suits patients.
To provide a patient-focused, modern health service in London requires a radical programme of change. The work will be carried forward by the London implementation group, reporting to me and working with the existing health agencies in the capital. It will start now, work quickly and keep to a strict timetable.
The first step must be a substantial improvement in primary care in London. That means the development of

higher quality, more accessible health services at local level —provided through GPs, nurses and other professionals in the community.
I am today establishing a London initiative zone covering the most deprived parts of the city where services can be most improved. I will be providing £170 million of capital investment over the next six years for improvements in the LIZ area. Much of that money will be used to provide new and improved premises for GPs and their teams where needed, and to provide new primary care centres.
Next year alone, we will invest over £40 million additional funds in primary and community health services. In addition, a further £10 million will be specifically targeted to ease waiting time problems for inner London residents.
We will strengthen the training of family doctors, nurses and other professional staff. We will bring experienced GPs into the capital, perhaps on short-term appointments.
We will be looking at new ways of providing services —by employing some GPs directly, by reviewing relevant aspects of the GP contract, such as the system of deprivation payments, by developing the GP fund holding initiative in London, which has brought so many benefits to patients elsewhere, and by much else besides.
We expect the social services to play their full part in ensuring effective integration of local health and social services. They must make use of the opportunities provided by our community care reforms and the significantly increased resources available through the special transitional grant.
We also want to make the best use of the special skills and talents of the voluntary sector. I can announce today that I am making a further £7.5 million available over the next three years to build up the role and work of the voluntary organisations.
To focus minds on innovation and experiment, we will provide a further £1 million to initiate a London primary health care challenge fund. We look to others also to contribute to the fund. It will make money available, on a competitive bidding basis, to fund experimental schemes, especially those which aim to bring local and hospital care together and those involving the voluntary, independent or social services sectors.
Putting those ideas into place involves a shift from care in acute hospitals to primary care. This, in turn, means building up services outside hospital, with fewer hospital beds and fewer sites where acute hospital care is delivered.
We need to reduce the excessive duplication of specialist services. I am announcing today six simultaneous reviews of those services to help us determine where best to concentrate specialist services to provide high quality cost-effective care. Each review will be taken forward urgently under the joint leadership of a distinguished clinician and a senior NHS manager of a purchasing authority. They will report by the end of May.
Accident and emergency services will mainly be provided from fully-equipped departments which have good access to back-up specialist services. In addition, we envisage an increasingly important role for minor injuries clinics.
But there is also a case for some rationalisation of accident and emergency services. In particular, the regions are setting in hand consultation on the closure of the A and


E at Charing Cross when the new Chelsea-Westminster is available, and on the closure of full-scale A and E at St. Bartholomew's.
We are determined that the London ambulance service should continue to make progress, to deliver a much-improved service for the considerable sums of money invested in it.
The new Chelsea-Westminster hospital is one of the most modern and advanced hospitals in Europe. This £200 million development is further proof of the Government's commitment to the national health service in London. Its completion marks the beginning of a new and better pattern of services in this sector of London.
A great deal of work has been done, in addition to the Tomlinson report. On the basis of the information before me, I have decided that there is no financial case for relocating the Royal Brompton and Royal Marsden hospitals to the Charing Cross hospital. This decision has clear implications for the future of that hospital. I have asked that detailed proposals for its future to be drawn up by the autumn. The London implementation group will also consider where best to relocate the maternity services currently provided at Queen Charlotte's hospital.
We cannot sustain extensive overlap or duplication in this part of London. In the long run, the best way forward may be an integrated health sciences centre, based at the Royal Brompton and the Royal Marsden, their respective institutes, and the Chelsea and Westminster hospital, with links to Imperial College. We will pursue that idea with those organisations.
In south-east London, consultation is under way on the proposal to merge the management of Guy's and St. Thomas's. If a Guy's/St. Thomas's trust is established, we will ask the new trust board to bring forward proposals, within six months, for consolidating the hospital services.
We also propose that the University College and Middlesex hospitals should continue to work up a proposal for rationalisation as quickly as possible. This would be considered with other priorities and subject to statutory consultation in respect of service changes. A development considerably smaller than the current hospitals combined seems likely.
In the east of London, significant changes are needed to provide a better pattern of services for the local population. People in Hackney and the surrounding area will be best served by developing the Homerton hospital to meet their needs. To make that possible, the Homerton will be established as a separate directly managed unit, with a view to it offering its patients the benefits of trust status from April 1994. We will consider urgently the proposal to build a further phase of the Homerton.
We believe it will be in the best interests of local people if some of the acute services currently at St. Bartholomew's at Smithfield are relocated to the Homerton. The hospital at Smithfield cannot continue as it is. That fact is well recognised, not least by the management and clinicians at St. Barthlomew's. Its precise future must depend crucially on the outcome of the speciality reviews and on whether or not purchasers wish to send their patients to it. In view of this, I have decided that the Barts NHS trust should not come into operation on 1 April and the shadow trust is therefore to be dissolved.
There are, in our judgment, three options for the future of St. Bartholomew's. The first is closure of the hospital site at Smithfield, with its specialist services relocating elsewhere. The second is joint management of St.

Bartholomew's and the Royal London hospital. The new management would be responsible for determining whether, in light of the demand for its services, the combined hospital can continue operating from two major acute sites. The third is retention of Smithfield as a much smaller specialist hospital.
I have set in hand an urgent appraisal of each of those options, to be concluded by the autumn. The proposal which emerges will, of course, be subject to statutory consultation. Under any of the options, the services provided at Smithfield, and the number of beds, would be substantially reduced. I propose to consult separately on whether to replace its full scale A and E department with a 12-hour weekday minor injuries clinic.
The Government will also consult on proposals for the merged management of Northwick Park and St. Mark's and, subject to a sound business case being made, the relocation of St. Mark's to Northwick Park.
On medical education, Professor Tomlinson's proposals for mergers of London's free-standing medical schools with the major colleges of the University of London have been widely supported. They are in line with the university's long-standing policy.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education has welcomed Sir Bernard's broad conclusions on education and research. He has asked the Higher Education Funding Council for England to take them forward, working with those involved, to ensure that health and education changes march in step. The funding council will consider the issues raised in the Tomlinson report about student numbers in London.
Our proposals will have significant implications for NHS manpower in London. We will make sure that their skills are kept within the NHS, by redeployment and retraining wherever possible. I intend to establish a clearing house to help those staff who cannot find alternative employment through the normal arrangements.
The Tomlinson report made clear that the root cause of London's problems is not a lack of resources. Indeed, hon. Members from outside the capital often point to the consequences for their constituents of the fact that 20 per cent. of NHS resources are spent in London on 15 per cent. of the population.
A top priority must be to make the NHS in London more efficient and effective. At the moment, we provide bridging funding to London hospitals to help them survive the loss of income they face from the fact that money is following the patients elsewhere. That is not a sensible long-term use of funds. It is unfair to London and unfair to the rest of the country. We will tackle those inefficiencies. Over a period of time that will mean more money for better services outside London.
I have not the time to describe every proposal now. Full details are contained in a document "Making London Better", published today, copies of which are available in the Vote Office.
No change is no option. Sir Bernard Tomlinson spoke of a "spiral of decline" if we do not act now. The programme of improvement must be balanced. Rationalisation of hospital services must be paced alongside the complementary build-up of services outside hospital.
London deserves a first-class primary health care service, fit for the 21st century. London deserves a better-balanced hospital service, targeted on patient needs.


London deserves the radical overhaul which, for years, many have promised but none has delivered. Under our proposals, that is what London will get.
We have accepted the need for radical change. We will deliver it. My programme offers the opportunity to cure London's ills and to make London better. I commend it to the House.

Mr. David Blunkett: I pay tribute to my colleagues, who made a series of 39 visits and met more than 2,000 people when examining Sir Bernard Tomlinson's proposals.
Opposition Members find the statement deeply disappointing. It is a damp squib, with a long fuse attached to a powder keg—a powder keg of cuts, closures and capitulation to Treasury demands for cash to pay for the Government's economic incompetence.
The statement is an admission of failure: the failure to match the challenge and opportunities for the future health care of the capital; the failure of the Government's health care changes, with their commercialisation and the internal market, which have made an existing problem into a crisis; and the Secretary of State's failure to win sufficient resources to do the job properly.
Does the Secretary of State not agree that she is a latter-day grand old Duke of York, who promises much and delivers nothing? The statement is the worst of all worlds. It allows existing hospitals to wither on the vine, but does not find the resources to put the necessary health care in place; it talks about merger and unites St. Thomas's and Guy's, under the chairmanship of an ex-Conservative Minister, with a direction to close one of those hospitals.
Will the Secretary of State confirm that this afternoon she has effectively announced the closure of St. Bartholomew's hospital? In her three proposed consultation plans, she spelt out that St. Bart's could not stay open as it is, and that it would not stay open under the plans put forward to her Minister of State. If it stays on the existing site, the accident and emergency unit will be a daytime unit only.
Will the Secretary of State confirm that in the document that she mentioned at the end of her statement she gives the game away? She says:
Our proposals will have significant implications for NHS manpower in London.
What does the phrase "significant implications" mean? Does not the document give the game away when it suggests that a cautionary estimate shows that 2,500 beds will close over the next five years? Who will pay for the redundancies, the manpower losses and the retraining? From where will the money come and why was that not mentioned in this afternoon's statement? Where is the Treasury—behind the scenes, determining the hand of the Secretary of State for Health?
What have we had this afternoon? Will the Secretary of State confirm that in the document to which she referred, euphemistically called "Making London Better"—the title makes me choke on my words as, far from being called "Making London Better", it should have been entitled "Making Matters Worse"—paragraph 9 states:
The operation of the NHS internal market will determine the precise patterns of health care in London in the future; just as it is a major influence for good elsewhere."?
Is the Secretary of State telling us the truth this afternoon or is it a fact that Charing Cross hospital, the

Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear hospital and, as I have already said, Barts, will close—and with Charing Cross, the medical school will close? Will there not be a major cutback in medical training in London? Is not her announcement this afternoon a totally inadequate response to the challenge facing London's health care and the rest of the nation?
Can the Secretary of State justify coming to the House this afternoon and pronouncing that increased general practitioner fund holding will help inner London, where there are three times the number of GPs working single-handedly from lock-up practices that need an immediate injection of cash? How can she tell the House this afternoon that less than £30 million a year over six years is an adequate response to the £400 million that the four inner London family health service authorities estimate to be the minimum to bring those GP premises up to an acceptable standard?
Can the Secretary of State really say that the £1 million challenge fund announced this afternoon will compensate for the complete annihilation of the inner city programme, the removal of the city challenge scheme, and the capping and closure of community care provision that will be made necessary by the Government settlement for local government from April? How can beds be freed to allow more patients to be treated if community care is neglected and the voluntary sector has to put up with £2 million a year to take on the task that local government in London should be allowed to fulfil?
Today is indeed a bad day for London, but it is also a bad day for the rest of Britain as the statement provides no answers for the investment needed in primary health care. It provides no answers to the needs of Londoners who wish to see in place proper accident and emergency facilities to deal with daytime and nighttime needs to ensure that the challenge of which the Secretary of State spoke on 29 October can be met.
Will the Secretary of State confirm that the figures and financing spelt out in Sir Bernard Tomlinson's report have already proved to be inadequate? Although the Secretary of State has announced this afternoon that the Royal Marsden and Brompton hospitals are to have a temporary reprieve because Ernst and Young found that it would cost £62 million to close them, her ancillary document states that, over the next five years, they will be "absorbed". That is another euphemism for "closed in due course".
This afternoon's exercise is one of duplicity. It allows hospitals to wither on the vine while covering the Government's back in a crisis of unemployment in facing the difficulties over the mining industry and the diktats of the Wakeham committee, which instructed the Secretary of State to cover up the closures, cutbacks and redundancies that are predicted.
Will the Secretary of State tell us how much is being clawed back from the rest of Britain's health service to pay for cuts, closures, redundancies and redeployments? How much will be clawed back from regional health service budgets over the next few years? Will we see a repetition of what happened to the Westminster and Chelsea hospital, which eventually cost £300,000 per bed? How much will be clawed back to close health services in London rather than improving them, and to put at risk projects and health care provision in the rest of the country?
Will the Secretary of State confirm that, far from protecting the rest of Britain by closing hospitals, beds and community facilities in London, she is putting at risk


projects that hon. Members on both sides of the House would like to see in their regions? Is not the document a capitulation to the Treasury rather than a health document ensuring the care of Londoners in the years to come?

Mrs. Bottomley: That was an enormously disappointing response. The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett) has himself said in the past that the status quo was no longer an option. It is no longer an option. In the past 100 years, 20 reports have been produced urging radical change, and that is what we intend to bring about.
I should be surprised if the hon. Gentleman's constituents in Sheffield did not point out to him that, if London contains 15 per cent. of the population, there is no long-term justice in its having 20 per cent. of the expenditure. The hon. Gentleman has again shown himself in his true colours, as an Opposition health spokesman sponsored by the National Union of Public Employees. Jobs are always put before patients.
We are going to see through firm action. The hon. Gentleman indulged in the traditional Labour pursuit of plucking a figure out of the air and then doubling it. Tomlinson recommended primary health care capital investment of £140 million; I have made available £170 million, as well as £10 million for the waiting list initiative and £7·5 million over three years for voluntary organisations. We are determined to see an improvement in primary care.
I have already referred to the generous funding for implementation of "Care in the Community". We must ensure that progress is made. We all recognise that some loved and respected London institutions will have to make difficult decisions; but it is not possible for 43 hospitals with 250 beds to remain unscathed at a time when, all over the home counties, new, high-quality hospitals are opening and providing excellent, cost-effective care.
We are not prepared to fudge this issue; we are not prepared to duck it. Any serious commentator, professional or politician will see the comments of the hon. Member for Brightside for what they are—a populist, knee-jerk, unreconstructed, destructive reaction.

Mrs. Marion Roe: I congratulate my right hon. Friend on her statement, and on the courage that she has displayed in grasping the nettle represented by this highly sensitive and emotive issue. As she knows, many ex-Londoners in my Hertfordshire constituency have been aggrieved for many years by the fact that too many resources have been taken by the London hospitals, while too few have gone to serve the local communities in Hertfordshire and the surrounding home county areas. How will my right hon. Friend's proposals address the problem so that I can assure my constituents that they will receive proper health care in their local areas?

Mrs. Bottomley: I can give my hon. Friend exactly that assurance. Once again, she has made an informed and authoritative contribution. Many health providers in constituencies such as hers are developing first-rate health services, and no longer wish their patients to go to London.
In the past, going to London was a free good, but an internal market means that the local health authority must pay, and pay the high prices of London. The fixed overhead costs of the London hospitals will become ever greater as health authorities in constituencies such as that

of my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Mrs. Roe) make the understandable and sensible decision to treat patients locally. We estimate that, next year alone, £50 million worth of contracts will no longer go to London. We have to have managed change in London. We also need urgent change in London so that we can ensure a fairer distribution of health service resources across the country.

Ms. Liz Lynne: I welcome the fact that the Secretary of State has announced that she does not intend to close hospitals wholesale. At least she has partially taken advice and intends to go out to consultation. I do not believe, however, that the £170 million to which she referred for primary health care will be enough. Will the Secretary of State make a commitment today that the £170 million will at least be ring fenced or earmarked for primary health care? Will she also make a commitment that she will not backtrack, as she did with the alcohol and drug misuse budget? Will she make a further firm commitment that before any hospitals are closed primary health care will be in place?
I welcome the fact that £10 million has been given towards cutting down waiting lists in London, but I should like to find out exactly when waiting lists in London will be cleared with that money. Nevertheless, I am grateful that that money has been provided.

Mrs. Bottomley: I thank the hon. Lady. I can give her an assurance that the £170 million for investing in primary health care in London will be used only for that purpose within the London initiative zone. I remind her that Sir Bernard Tomlinson's estimate was £140 million. We are making £170 million available.
I find the hon. Lady's comparison with the drug and alcohol ring-fenced money rather strange. Apart from the fact that we ring-fenced the drug and alcohol money, we ring-fenced the whole of the community care money—£565 million, an increase of a third over what was available through social security. That will lead to £30 million more in London next year and £130 million more for community care in London by 1996.
In the discussions on the waiting time proposals, I know that the hon. Lady made the point that more should happen about waiting times in London. The sum of £10 million will be spent in London. Good progress has already been made in the past year. The number of those waiting for more than a year in London has fallen by 61 per cent. in the past year, and the overall lists have fallen by 8 per cent.

Mr. Matthew Carrington: My right hon. Friend will know that the decision to close Charing Cross hospital will be met with horror in west London, where the facilities of that hospital are greatly needed in a very deprived part of the metropolis. Can my right hon. Friend explain why she has decided to pre-empt the specialty review in London by deciding to keep the Royal Brompton and the Royal Marsden hospitals independent and not to move them to the Charing Cross site, ahead of a full review of the cancer and chest specialties in London?

Mrs. Bottomley: I well understand my hon. Friend's support for his own local hospital and his concern about my statement. After studying further information during our discussions on the Tomlinson report and further appraisals that we were able to undertake, we took the


view that it was not a cost-effective option to move the Royal Brompton and the Royal Marsden hospitals to the Charing Cross site. However, my hon. Friend is right: we are establishing forthwith specialty reviews. They will be chaired by a clinician from outside London in each of the six key areas. We hope that the Royal Brompton and the Royal Marsden hospitals will come together as a trust, sharing costs and seeking considerable savings. They will be subject to those specialty reviews, as will all the other specialist centres in London.

Mr. Peter Shore: Is the Secretary of State aware that the statement that there are too many hospital beds in London will be greeted with ribald laughter in a large part of the capital, where long waiting lists are still growing? May I ask her, since she did not, in my recollection, mention the Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children, whether good sense has prevailed in that case and that it will be left alone to carry on serving the people in my part of London in the way that it has done in the past?

Mrs. Bottomley: I am surprised by the right hon. Gentleman's comment, since informed commentators, professionals and many politicians on all sides have recognised that there is a need to tackle the over-provision of beds in London. That over-provision can be tackled only as the primary care services develop. I should have thought that the right hon. Gentleman would agree that there was a misuse of hospital beds in London because of inadequate primary care services. In addition, the implementation of community care must be closely tied in with further steps on hospitals.
As for the Queen Elizabeth hospital in Hackney, which I have visited a number of times, it will join with the Homerton hospital to continue to provide a good quality local service. We certainly hope that the research, staff and ties of loyalty with Great Ormond Street will continue, but when the right hon. Gentleman studies the Tomlinson report, he will see that it makes a powerful argument for ensuring that single specialty hospitals are drawn in to the local community that they serve so that they can benefit from the range of skills at the local district general hospital, as with the London Chest hospital joining the London hospital.

Dame Jill Knight: Does my right hon. Friend recall a leader article in The Guardian last October or November which said that only a political ostrich could fail to take note of the fact that more money per head was spent from the health budget on London than on anywhere else but that it provided a worse service? Will she confirm that most of the London hospitals were set up nearly 100 years ago and that not only treatment but the use of day beds, instead of keeping people in hospital, has changed out of all recognition since the time when the London hospital scene was first established? Will she, therefore, take the opportunity to tell the political ostriches and dinosaurs on the Opposition Benches—they seem to be about half and half—the truth about the matter?

Mrs. Bottomley: I well remember that editorial in The Guardian. I also remember a similar report in Nursing Standard which said that the professional organizations

which have for years been arguing for a radical shift in resources from hospitals to primary care cannot now condemn a report which is founded on that principle.
My hon. Friend is, as ever, exactly right. The provision of health care in London is based in the past. We are determined to plan for the future. Florence Nightingale said that St. Thomas's should move out to Blackheath, and 20 reports in 100 years have urged action on us. We are determined to see exactly that action.

Mr. Brian Sedgemore: Why does the Secretary of State talk to the House as though she thought that St. Bartholomew's and the Homerton hospital were separate hospitals? As she is the Secretary of State for Health, she must know that it is the same institution run by the same people, with the same doctors and consultants. She proposes to destroy both hospitals. Does she not understand that her announcement has shown her to be a medically ignorant political chancer who deserves the undying contempt of us all because she is putting at risk 100,000 people in south Hackney, 100,000 in Islington and 300,000 in the City? What is the virtue in that?

Mrs. Bottomley: I am sorry to have inflamed the hon. Gentleman. I am used to reading his castigation of his own party's spokesman on the matter of health reform in London.
I have announced that we wish Homerton hospital to proceed with proposals for its phase 2 development. We envisage a central position for Homerton in serving the local population and in working with joint management with the Queen Elizabeth hospital in Hackney because we well recognise the needs of that part of London.
St. Bartholomew's will have to face the economic facts of life and the reality of health care today. It has the choice of closing, setting up as a small specialist unit or joining the London hospital. In my view, it is a choice between sentiment and excellence. It will need to consider urgently the way it wishes to proceed. I am concerned to serve local people, and the Homerton hospital is the place that will best do that.

Mr. James Couchman: As perhaps the only former London health authority chairman in the House, I welcome my right hon. Friend's announcement. I have been the chairman of an outer London district and now represent a constituency beyond that. Both have been deprived of resources because of the over-resourcing of inner London. My constituents and those for whom I was responsible as a health authority chairman will welcome her statement. However, may I ask for her assurance that the resources necessary to ensure that people living in outer London and beyond can be treated in their own district general hospital will be provided from the savings made from London? Without those savings people will still be inclined to go to inner London for their treatment. Will she also ensure that, if some consultants will no longer have jobs in inner London, they will be steered to outer London and beyond for their new jobs?

Mrs. Bottomley: Once again, my hon. Friend, who has great knowledge of these matters, speaks on behalf of many others in the House. We estimate that next year contracts to the tune of £50 million will no longer come to


London because many, like my hon. Friend, wish patients to be treated more cost effectively in their local communities.
We wish to ensure that, as a result of the specialty reviews, those units which find no future for themselves in London, and particularly their consultants, should certainly have the opportunity to find a productive role in the home counties and elsewhere in the country.

Ms. Mildred Gordon: Does the Secretary of State know that on 29 January there was a seven-hour waiting time at the accident and emergency department of the Royal London hospital, Whitechapel, two days before the accident and emergency department at Mile End was closed for good against the wishes of the population? She now proposes that the accident and emergency department at Barts should go for a burton and that its workload should also go to the Royal London hospital.
Is the Secretary of State aware that the Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children serves children in Tower Hamlets, which has the fastest growing birth rate in the country, and that if that is merged with Homerton, those children will go to the Royal London hospital, further increasing the workload there and, presumably, the waiting time? I do not know what waiting time is considered acceptable in the document so cynically entitled "Making London Better", but the waiting time and the workload at the Royal London are becoming unacceptable.
What sense is there in destroying the marvellous work done at Great Ormond Street by taking away its research department? What sense is there in merging the London Chest hospital with the Royal London so that within five years it will be moved from its salubrious green site in Bethnal Green and rebuilt on what is a dirty, dusty and polluted site for chest patients on Whitechapel road? What nonsense is all this?

Madam Speaker: Before the Secretary of State answers, I plead with right hon. and hon. Members on the Front and Back Benches to put short questions and make speedy answers. Many hon. Members want to participate and I cannot allow questions to continue for much longer.

Mrs. Bottomley: I well understand many of the points of misinformation in the hon. Lady's question. She will be able to study the document and will in many ways be reassured when she understands the arguments behind many of the decisions.
It is appropriate for specialist hospitals to be under the organisation of a local general hospital in order to provide a broader-based health care for those in need of acute services. The hon. Lady's constituents, who may go to the Queen Elizabeth hospital with their children, will be treated at the Homerton, perhaps as a maternity or a surgical case, and we envisage the management joining the Chest hospital there. I have not announced that those hospitals will move into the buildings of the hospitals under whose management they will come.
On waiting times, the hon. Lady may not have heard me point out that in London in the past year the number of those waiting for more than a year has fallen by 61 per cent., which is a considerable achievement. The overall list has fallen by 8 per cent.
With regard to the hon. Lady's last point on pressure on accident and emergency, I have visited the accident and emergency department at the Royal London. She will be

aware of the tremendous unpredictability of demands on accident and emergency services, but all are agreed that one of the dilemmas in London is the inappropriate use of accident and emergency services by people who would normally go to a GP or a community nurse. The right way forward is by developing effective alternatives that local people trust.

Sir John Wheeler: It takes great courage and conviction to do what is right in the health service for people in London, and my right hon. Friend has achieved that today. Does she agree that the most important part of these changes is the development of the primary health care service, particularly in London? Will she add further to her statement on how she sees the flow of funding and the development of that service leading to the objectives that she has outlined today?

Mrs. Bottomley: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. It is exactly by effective and fast development of primary care that we shall achieve change. The London initiative zone offers the opportunity to pioneer and innovate and to find new ways to make sure that we have the primary care that meets the needs of Londoners.
It is well understood that London has a greater number of homeless people, of people from ethnic minorities, of people with drug addiction problems and of people not registered with GPs. GPs have difficulties on premises; there are more single-handed GPs and there are more older GPs. It is by finding new ways and new procedures for tackling those problems that we shall make progress. We shall set up a primary care forum, to be chaired by the chairman of the London implementation group, to take forward change swiftly. We anticipate spending £40 million extra on primary care services in the first year alone.

Ms. Kate Hoey: Does the Secretary of State not agree with me that it is a bit of a farce to talk about consultation on the amalgamation of trusts between St. Thomas's and Guy's when the chair has already been appointed and the whole thing has obviously been sewn up? Would she clarify what she means in her statement by saying that those two hospitals are consolidating? Does she mean that one of them will close, whatever is said, and will she say what will happen to those people who depend on the accident and emergency service at St. Thomas's if that accident and emergency service should ever close?

Mrs. Bottomley: At present there is statutory consultation under way on the proposal for Guy's and St. Thomas's to join together as an NHS trust. We are then asking them to go out to consultation on an independent appraisal on site options. Radical change has to go forward in London. This cannot be achieved without difficult decisions being made and on the basis of the independent appraisal. We shall certainly want them to follow through the recommendations of that appraisal, but it will be within their responsibilities and for their decisions as an NHS trust.
The hon. Lady well knows that within her constituency there is the development of initiatives such as the West Lambeth community care centre. She well knows that that is the right way to provide a modern health service for her constituents. It is not possible for her to seek development of initiatives such as the West Lambeth community care centre, as well as having, within a short distance,


500 hospital consultants at Guy's, St. Thomas's and King's. It is that sort of imbalance that makes hon. Members from outside London urge swift action.

Dr. Charles Goodson-Wickes: My right hon. Friend will recognise that her announcement today will be the cause of qualified rejoicing at Bart's, but I hope that, on reflection, the hon. Member for Hackney, South and Shoreditch (Mr. Sedgemore), who has been robust in his defence of Bart's, will recognise that we now have two viable alternatives to the disastrous Tomlinson recommendation to close Bart's and sell the site. May I urge my right hon. Friend to ensure that the consultation process is speedy and vigorous and, this time, is based on properly-based data?

Mrs. Bottomley: I can give my hon. Friend precisely that assurance. I think that St. Bartholomew's has now begun to face the economic realities. It will not be possible to persuade health authorities to send patients to hospitals that do not provide a cost-effective service. That is the reality of the NHS reforms that we have established. It will have to choose between whether it takes forward its ideas of becoming a small specialty hospital or decides to combine with the Royal London. There are strong arguments that, if it sees the future as being a centre of excellence, it will be by following the example of very many others and saying that it wants to pool the skills, resources and expertise of their teams. These decisions need to be taken swiftly, because we wish to avoid the spiral of decline outlined by Sir Bernard Tomlinson. The specialty reviews are to complete their work within three months, and the further proposals are to be ready within six months.

Mrs. Bridget Prentice: The Secretary of State has said today that she is to initiate a new London primary health care challenge. She also said that she was looking to others to contribute to the fund. Is she prepared to tell us who those others might be? Are they to be the banks, or are they to be McDonald's and the other hamburger joints? Or are they to be the patients themselves? Having contributed to that fund, who is to decide the competitive basis on which the bids will be won? How many people in the local community will have a say in what happens at the local hospital?

Mrs. Bottomley: I am very surprised to hear the hon. Lady's prejudice against McDonald's. If McDonald's wishes to make a contribution to the primary care challenge fund, we shall certainly welcome it. We wish to have a great number of innovative ideas about where we can find premises. The real challenge for primary health care in London is the issue of premises. We certainly will explore the idea of family doctor premises becoming established in a wide range of places, and—who knows? —McDonald's may well be an option.
I thank the hon. Lady for her suggestion. But, of course, it is a travesty of the amount of money that I have announced: £170 million over six years for capital development; £40 million in the first year; £7·5 million for voluntary organisations; as well as the £1 million for the challenge fund.

Dame Angela Rumbold: My right hon. Friend will know that I served on one of the previous investigations into the London health service, so

I am more than well aware of the difficult decisions that she and her Ministers have to take in considering the London issue. I congratulate her on the very skilful way in which she has solved the problems. I believe that the answers that she has outlined to the House this afternoon will certainly provide much better services for London in the long term, and better services for hospitals outside London. I also thank her on behalf of my constituents, many of whom work in the Royal Marsden at Sutton, because they will be very relieved to understand that their jobs are secure for the time being. May I ask her, however, what she envisages for the specialty reviews? A little more clarity on those would be helpful.

Mrs. Bottomley: We shall be establishing forthwith specialty reviews in the six key areas of cancer services, cardiac services, neuro-sciences, renal services and paediatric services, to be chaired by an expert from outside London and with a manager from within London. They will report within three months. There will be further consultation on those reports afterwards.
I thank my right hon. Friend for her generous remarks. We have to see change; we have to see change to a tight timetable. At the same time, we have to go through the proper procedures of consultation. I am very appreciative of the way in which most people in the service, most commentators and most professionals have well understood the need for change. No change is no option. We need now to carry it forward.

Ms. Glenda Jackson: Is the Secretary of State aware that it will come as a surprise to my constituents to discover that London is over-funded, in the light of rising waiting lists, cancelled operations, the mentally ill wandering our streets and a constant diminution of the services for geriatrics?
Why is the right hon. Lady so concerned about saving money in the London area? The Royal Free medical school in my constituency can train a doctor for between £10,000 and £12,000 a year, as can the other London teaching hospitals, yet the universities of Oxford and Cambridge can only train for £18,000 a year. Is she perhaps not concentrating her sights in the wrong area?

Mrs. Bottomley: I am surprised that the hon. Lady for ever denigrates the achievements of the Royal Free hospital, because it is providing more high quality care to more patients. I have already informed the House that waiting lists are coming down. There is a 61 per cent. fall in the number of patients waiting for more than a year, and an 8 per cent. fall overall—

Ms. Jackson: On a point of order, Madam Speaker.

Madam Speaker: Order. I have to take points of order at the end of the statement, as the hon. Lady knows—[Interruption.] Order. An argument about policy is not a point of order for the Chair.

Mrs. Bottomley: The hon. Lady is right to say that we need to develop better services for the mentally ill who, above all, need primary care services. They need more community psychiatric nurses, so that many of the changes that we propose will be nurse-led. Nursing will be the crucial professional group. London has twice as many consultants per head of the population as outside areas.


There is a distorted budget in London, focusing on inappropriate priorities. We wish to introduce changes to allow people to achieve exactly those objectives.

Sir Peter Emery: Does my right hon. Friend realise that the House knows that she has an extremely difficult task? Does she know that I was under surgery only last Thursday for a leg and vein operation and, due to the brilliance of a young houseman at the Charing Cross hospital, Dr. Backhouse, who spotted a growth on my chest that has since proved to be cancerous, the professor of surgery there, Mr. Greenhalgh, has removed it all so that I have been given a clean bill of health—with much relief to the Chief Whip, I am told?
Will not Charing Cross be given the opportunity, with the use of the internal market, to see whether Riverside health authority and North Thames health authority and surrounding areas can provide the necessary psychiatric and community care in west London which would then allow this immensely successful hospital to survive?

Mrs. Bottomley: I am delighted to see my right hon. Friend with us—I am probably as delighted as the Whips are—and I share his tremendous commendation of the doctors, nurses and others who work in the national health service. We in Britain can have confidence that we have a national health service available to all and, of course, we wish that to continue. However, a few people believe it is possible to provide a cost-effective service in future without addressing the problems in London. We will consider closely all the options at the Charing Cross and the region and try to plan for the future.
As my right hon. Friend rightly says, there are a number of beds for geriatric and mentally-ill patients for whom provision will have to be made. We cannot take forward our proposals by fudging every issue. We will take decisions in the interests of the national health service in London and elsewhere. I believe that all those who work in those great institutions know full well that change has to come. They wish decisions to be made and uncertainties to be brought to an end.

Ms. Diane Abbott: As one of the Members of Parliament representing Hackney, my concern throughout has been the level and quality of health care available to people living in Hackney. On behalf of those people, I must give one cheer to the announcement that stage 2 of the Homerton might be built, but I must stress how vital it is to health care in Hackney.
Will the Secretary of State say whether the £170 million being made available over six years is new money?
Finally, on redundancies, Conservative Members are quick to sneer when we talk about hospital workers, but let me remind them that thousands of hospital workers whose jobs are threatened are women, relatively low-paid workers, and often single wage earners in areas of high unemployment. Often, they are black women who came to the United Kingdom in the 1950s and 1960s and who have given their lives to the British health service. Opposition Members should give a little more respect to, and be a little more concerned about, the issue of redundancies.

Mrs. Bottomley: 1 am pleased that the hon. Lady applauds the further plans for Homerton. We recognise that there is a need for further investment to serve that part

of London. I am referring to the extra £170 million for primary care, apart from all the other announcements which I have made today.
I well appreciate the point which the hon. Lady makes about staff. When we first published the Tomlinson report we sent a newsletter to all staff in London. I am now sending another letter to all those who work within the service. Of course, uncertainty is difficult for them: they need to know the full facts as soon as possible.
We are setting up a clearing house to ensure that, across London, we look carefully at redeployment, retraining and the way in which we can most sensitively and helpfully handle the human resource question. Each year, there is a turnover of about 20 per cent. in nurses in London. I hope that it will be possible to keep the redundancies to a minimum.

Mr. David Mellor: May I thank my right hon. Friend for what she said, and especially for acceding to the representations of a number of us that the Royal Brompton and the Royal Marsden should be allowed to continue their excellent work where they are? I am sure that there will be enormous relief about that.
I invite my right hon. Friend to recall that it was the London health consortium, under the last Labour Government, which first proposed that there should be a cut of 2,000 acute beds in London. Since then, the national health service has been transformed by the creation of hospitals of excellence throughout the nation. That makes this restructuring of London's health services—however painful—long overdue and necessary. I assure my right hon. Friend that she will have the support of all Conservative London Members if she proceeds as sensibly down that course as she has given evidence of doing this afternoon.

Mrs. Bottomley: I thank my right hon. Friend for so eloquently and effectively putting precisely the argument: we have to go forward with these changes. I thank him for his comments about the Royal Brompton and the Royal Marsden. We are persuaded that, together with Chelsea and Westminster and the associated institutes, there is scope for the development of a Chelsea health sciences centre. As special health authorities come into the market, we will protect the research component, but it is important that they play their full part and look for the savings and efficiencies which all other members of the health service family are exploring.

Mr. Simon Hughes: Will the Secretary of State guarantee to the people of south-east London in general and the users of Guy's hospital in particular that, as a result of her announcement today, the time between referral to a hospital and treatment will be shorter and a bed will be available when they need it, but that the retention of health care both at Guy's and St. Thomas', as a result of her carefully worded announcement, is still an option for the trust to consider and a possibility at the end of any review period which a new trust will start in a few months' time?

Mrs. Bottomley: I can certainly guarantee that, if not as a result of the announcement immediately, certainly the development of our plans for London's health service is intended precisely to provide better health care for London and Londoners.
Often there has been a predominance of specialist services at the expense of routine local services which local people need, whether from the primary health care team or, when appropriate, the hospital. The hon. Gentleman will know that only a short distance from his constituency, at King's College hospital, 40 per cent. of the patients attending there would normally go to a GP or a nurse. We must achieve a better balance within London and across the country.
On the proposals for Guy's and St. Thomas's, it really is a matter for the trust once it is established, if I agree to it, subject to consultation. Of course, I must preserve the legal niceties when the trusts go forward for their site appraisals.

Mr. Toby Jessel: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the drop in waiting lists is tremendously welcome? Surely what matters to patients is not only the number of beds but the effective use to which they are put?

Mrs. Bottomley: How right my hon. Friend is. I agree with him.

Mr. Jeremy Corbyn: May I invite the Secretary of State to stop playing ducks and drakes with London and the rest of the country when boasting of good quality health care? Is she now aware that the Tomlinson report is seriously flawed in much of its analysis of the provision of beds in London and the use of accident and emergency departments because of the incidence of poverty and homelessness in London? Does she not recognise that increasingly inadequate primary care resources will probably lead to an increased demand for hospital places? Does she not think that it is necessary to halt the hospital closure programme and instead examine seriously the health needs of Londoners as a whole, including improvements in the primary and community care facilities, which receive only a small amount of money from her proposals?

Mrs. Bottomley: I do not accept what the hon. Gentleman says. I am Secretary of State for the national health service. At present there is one hospital doctor or GP to every 500 people in London. The national average is one to every 1,100. There are twice as many consultants in London. All the figures are out of balance. In my view, the Tomlinson report, following as it did the King's Fund report, in which representatives of all political parties were involved, makes a powerful case which any responsible Secretary of State would want to see taken forward.

Sir Rhodes Boyson: I should like to ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State two questions. First, people in my constituency and throughout London are proud of the specialist hospitals in London, which are renowned not only in London but throughout Britain and the world. Is she aware of the depth of feeling about that in London? Secondly, my right hon. Friend said that 2,500 hospital beds in London would be taken away. Although I warmly welcome the £10 million to cut waiting lists, I have to battle every day to get people into hospital. Is my right hon. Friend aware that the people in London will be slightly cynical about the idea that there is a quick way into hospitals in London?

Mrs. Bottomley: My right hon. Friend is right when he says that there is great respect for the specialist hospitals. However, the issue is not necessarily the buildings but the skills of those who work there. I sometimes think that my job is supposed to be an arm of the Department of National Heritage. I do not see it in that way. There are strong cases for ensuring that specialist skills are part of a wider team with a wider range of skills, expertise and back-up facilities. That is the thrust of the Tomlinson report.
My right hon. Friend referred to the difficulty of his constituents in getting a hospital bed. That is pertinent to the lack of primary care in London and the use of accident and emergency departments where otherwise people would use a GP. It was estimated by one of the teaching hospitals that up to 15 per cent. of the beds were occupied by people who elsewhere would have been cared for in the community. Of course, we must get primary care right, but the combination of rationalisation of specialist services, contracts leaving London and the development of primary care will make such changes absolutely essential.

Rev. Martin Smyth: I understand the difficulties of the Secretary of State when she makes decisions about London, but let me put it on record that it is not a case of the rest of the nation against London. I have had representations from constituents in Northern Ireland specifically about the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear, the Royal Marsden and St. Bartholomew's hospitals.
I should like the Secretary of State to consider another aspect. How will the students who are being trained obtain sufficient experience and hands-on treatment in the medical schools of London if we scatter the hospitals and research facilities for the nation?

Mrs. Bottomley: To start with the hon. Gentleman's final point, he is probably well aware that many of the London teaching hospitals have difficulty in putting enough cases through for the medical students to see. That is the dilemma. The rationalisation of the medical schools and the associated hospitals is given high priority by the Higher Education Funding Council. We want to see curriculum changes in undergraduate education. We need better primary care facilities in London to enable students to learn.
The first part of the hon. Gentleman's remarks is totally in line with our proposals. I understand his point about sentiment and loyalty to particular institutions. The issue is not the obliteration of units and teams; it is the appropriate location of teams in a setting where they can make a contribution, along with others with different skills and expertise. That is the way forward if we are continue to have a centre of excellence, famous not only in this country but also in the world.

Sir Anthony Grant: Can my right hon. Friend confirm that her policy will be to the benefit of such hospitals as Addenbrookes—a teaching hospital—and Papworth, both of which are located in the fastest-growing area of the country and are just as excellent and important as London hospitals, which are in an area of declining population?

Mrs. Bottomley: My hon. Friend has the privilege of being served by two.first-rate hospitals. It will certainly be to the benefit of everyone in the country when we no longer


have to subsidise London to the extent to which it is being subsidised at the moment. We estimate that, this year, we are subsidising the London institutions to the tune of £50 million. Next year the figure is likely to be £100 million. As contracts are taken away, as patients wish to be treated outside London, the London hospitals will be left with very heavy, fixed overhead costs. Nobody is served when health resources are invested in buildings and an expensive infrastructure rather than in patients.

Ms. Dawn Primarolo: Does the Secretary of State agree that we should be discussing the report "Making London Better" rather than her statement? The report outlines clearly the fate of the London hospitals—death by a thousand cuts. The Secretary of State will not admit it to the House, but that is the Government's intention.
Does the right hon. Lady agree that it is wrong that the internal market should determine the pattern of health care in London, as well as in the rest of the country, which will suffer the same fate, as is detailed in paragraph 9 of the report? Does she agree that the Royal Brompton, the Royal Marsden, St. Bartholomew's and Charing Cross hospitals should not be left at the mercy of the market, to wither away on the vine, as is detailed in paragraph 62 of this report? Does the Secretary of State agree that special health authorities should not be exposed to the vagaries of the market and to certain destruction, as is detailed in paragraph 85 of the report?
Does the Secretary of State agree that the 20,000 health workers—nearly the same number as in the case of the miners—who will lose their jobs are not satisfied with the safeguards that she has announced to the House? Does she agree that any funding for London will be recycled money lost by London as a result of the introduction of weighted capitation? If that is not the case, where will the money come from? Will it be top-sliced from the regions? Will the Secretary of State confirm that UCH Middlesex and Great Ormond Street will remain in existence, that they will not be scaled down or eradicated? In this respect, I refer her to paragraph 66 of "Making London Better".
Does the Secretary of State accept that she has done nothing to arrest the decline of the health service in London and that her proposals on community care are pathetic in the extreme and will desperately disappoint GPs and primary health care workers in London, who can take no comfort from the pathetic provision of only £28 million a year to introduce and improve services?

Mrs. Bottomley: The hon. Lady's remarks are such irresponsible, misleading gibberish that I shall not bother to respond to them. She has been engaging in distortion. She cannot have listened to any of the constructive and helpful discussion that we have had this afternoon. I suggest that she read the report rather more carefully.
I confirm that our proposals are based on four central principles—that people who live and work in London must have ready access to the full range of services that they need; that services must be of a good standard and cost-effective; that the internal health market should work in London as elsewhere; and that high-quality medical education and research must be sustained and fostered. Those are the principles of this report, and they are the principles that we shall see executed.

Several hon. Members: rose—

Madam Speaker: Order. We must now move on.

Mr. Clive Soley: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. I realise that there is a time problem, but several London Members, including myself, are confronted with the closure of Queen Charlotte's hospital and with the proposed closure of Charing Cross hospital, which would have a dramatic effect on my constituency. We have not had a chance to raise these matters. May I ask for an urgent debate? As the Secretary of State herself said several times, this is not just a London issue but a national issue. The debate that I seek should take place in Government time and should be arranged soon.

Madam Speaker: I share the hon. Gentleman's disappointment at the fact that I have been unable to call more Members. I went carefully through the list of hon. Members in whose constituencies there are hospitals that are affected, and I attempted to call them. I also attempted to call Members for constituencies throughout other regions, as this is, of course, a national issue. The number of Members that I was able to call was limited by reason of long questions and, I may say, long answers. The House shares my disappointment at my having been unable to call more Members.

Ms. Glenda Jackson: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. The question that I put to the Secretary of State referred to the Royal Free hospital medical school. Much to my surprise, it seems that the Secretary of State does not realise that there is a Royal Free hospital and a Royal Free hospital medical school. She chose to centre her reply on the Royal Free hospital. She implied that I had been critical of the service provided by that hospital. In doing so, she insulted not me but the medical and nursing staff—

Madam Speaker: Order. I heard the exchange to which the hon. Lady refers. She must know that it is a matter for argument, and not a point of order for the Chair.

Mr. Corbyn: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. I understand your difficulties with regard to the business of the House, as that is, unfortunately, the responsibility of the Government. The problem is that Londonders have no means of expressing a view before the Secretary of State starts radically altering and closing hospitals throughout London. There will be no consultation. No health authority covers London. There are no elections to the bodies concerned.
I appeal to you, Madam Speaker, to use your best endeavours to ensure that there is an urgent debate in which all these issues can be discussed before the Secretary of State goes ahead and implements a policy that has no support from the people of London.

Madam Speaker: Hon. Members, including the hon. Gentleman, know that the business of the House is not a matter for the Speaker. I have no doubt that these issues will be raised with the Lord President of the Council during business questions.

ROAD TRAFFIC (AMENDMENT)

Mr. Keith Vaz presented a Bill to amend section 170 of the Road Traffic Act 1988: And the same was read a First time, and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 19 February 1993; and to be printed [Bill 137.]

Justice

Ms. Jean Corston: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make further provision for the investigation of alleged miscarriages of justice in connection with criminal proceedings in England and Wales; and for related purposes.
For many years the only thing ever said in this country about our criminal justice system was that it was the best in the world. There cannot be many people who would make such a claim now. Most people could recite part of the litany of cases involving the miscarriage of justice—the Guildford Four, the Birmingham Six, the Maguire Seven, the Winchester Three, the Cardiff Three, the Tottenham Three, Judith Ward, Stefan Kiszko.
The Guildford Four were set free in 1989. Since then more than 50 people have been released from prison, their convictions having been set aside or found to be unsafe or unsatisfactory. All those people were victims of miscarriage of justice.
Last November the National Association of Probation Officers and Liberty, both of which have given me advice and assistance in the preparation of this Bill, published a dossier of 163 cases in which there was some doubt about the safety of the convictions. Further, there cannot be an hon. Member who has not received letters from prisoners protesting their innocence. Many of them give rise to disquiet and unease. The House should also be aware that such prisoners pay a high price for protesting their innocence. The parole system is based on acknowledgement of guilt. Any prisoner who maintains innocence of the crime for which he or she is convicted will usually serve a longer sentence than the guilty.
In order to understand why my Bill is vital in restoring confidence to our criminal justice system it is necessary for me to describe the present procedure in cases of alleged miscarriage of justice. A convicted person appeals to the Home Secretary, who alone has the power to refer an individual case to the Court of Appeal for consideration. The case is then considered by the division of the Home Office known as C3. In reply to written questions from me, the Home Secretary confirmed that, during 1992, C3 received 790 representations alleging miscarriage of justice and that 178 were under active consideration. The average time taken to investigate a case was 41 days, although on 1 February this year, 27 cases had been outstanding for more than 12 months. During the whole of 1992, the Home Secretary referred just seven cases in respect of conviction back to the Court of Appeal. The House will also know of the diquiet arising from the Home Secretary's recent refusal to refer the case of the Bridgewater Three.
Another disquieting aspect of the present procedure is that, after the C3 investigation, the Home Office sends the papers to the relevant police force, and neither the convicted person nor his or her legal representative has a right to see the police comment or evidence. Such decisions should be independent of political control. It is not unknown for Home Secretaries to be determined not to be seen to be soft on crime, particularly when they have to face a baying Tory party conference.
Among those who have given support for an independent body are two former Conservative Home Secretaries, the present Foreign Secretary and the right

hon. Member for Mole Valley (Mr. Baker). Furthermore, in his second report on the Maguire case, presented to the House on 3 December 1992, Lord Justice May said:
new independent machinery must be set up to carry out all those investigations and inquiries which the circumstances of a given case may require. It will be necessary for this machinery to be set up by statute. It will no doubt have its own procedural rules, but subject to these it should have the power and resources to investigate any conviction which may merit such an inquiry. These will no doubt include the fullest power to call for documents and other exhibits and to be able to enforce their production.
He went on:
if, upon the completion of the investigation, it is concluded that a miscarriage of justice may have occurred, whatever machinery is set up will no doubt enable the case and the result of the investigations to be referred to the Court of Appeal
My Bill provides for the establishment of just such a statutory body—the criminal justice review board. The Lord Chancellor will be required to appoint 12 members to the board. They will include people with knowledge of the criminal justice system, those with knowledge and experience of the supervision or aftercare of discharged prisoners and a psychiatrist. The board will have a proper representation of women and people from ethnic minorities.
Any convicted prisoner may refer his or her case to the board, provided that they have been through the Court of Appeal procedure or there has been unreasonable delay. The board will have power to appoint a case officer to investigate any application where it considers it is justified, and the case officer will have wide powers of investigation, search and seizure. At the end of the investigation, the case officer will be required to submit a report to a panel of board members, chaired by a High Court judge.
If the board then considers that there may have been a miscarriage of justice or that the case raises an arguable point of law, it and it alone can refer the case to the Court of Appeal, where it will be treated as an appeal against conviction. The appellant will also be entitled to receive written reasons for the board's decision.
The Bill further provides that, following any criminal conviction on indictment, all the evidence should be preserved. We are too familiar with miscarriage of justice cases where it is not possible to bring proceedings against, for example, police officers who have behaved improperly, because evidence has mysteriously disappeared. For far too long, honest police officers have paid the price of suspicion and disbelief because of those who bend the rules to get a conviction.
We should also treat with caution the assertion that the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 has ensured that the incidence of miscarriage of justice will be rare. There is an emerging body of evidence to show that that faith is misplaced.
Some may argue that there is no need for the House to consider the matter at present, in view of the fact that the Royal Commission on Criminal Justice, chaired by Lord Runciman, is currently conducting its inquiry and will report to the House in the fullness of time. There are those who may agree with the former Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, who said that royal commissions took minutes and wasted years. But it cannot be denied that, even with a fair wind, implementation of any recommendations could not take place before 1996 or 1997. Further, we are entitled to assume that the Runciman inquiry will come up


with proposals to ensure that there will be no miscarriages of justice in the future. My Bill will ensure that past mistakes are rectified; past wrongs righted.
For too long, the protestations of innocence from behind prison walls have been as silent screams. It is about time we ensured that those pleas can be properly heard, and I therefore commend the Bill to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Ms. Jean Corston, Mr. Chris Mullin, Mr. Andrew F. Bennett; Mr. Richard Alexander, Mrs. Barbara. Roche, Mr. Harry Greenway, Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones, Mr. Stephen Byers, Ms. Tessa Jowell, Mr. John Battle and Ms. Glenda Jackson.

JUSTICE

Ms. Jean Corston accordingly presented a Bill to make further provision for the investigation of alleged miscarriages of justice in connection with criminal proceedings in England and Wales; and for related purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 19 February, and to be printed. [Bill 136.]

Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill

As amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.

New clause 6

CONFIDENTIALITY OF TRADE UNION'S REGISTER OF MEMBERS'

NAMES AND ADDRESSES

'. After section 24 of the 1992 Act there shall be inserted—

"Securing confidentiality of register during ballots.

24A.—(1) This section applies in relation to a ballot of the members of a trade union on—

(a) an election under Chapter IV for a position to which that Chapter applies,
(b) a political resolution under Chapter VI, and
(c) a resolution to approve an instrument of amalgamation or transfer under Chapter VII.

(2) Where this section applies in relation to a ballot the trade union shall impose the duty of confidentiality in relation to the register of members' names and addresses on the scrutineer appointed by the union for the purposes of the ballot and on any person appointed by the union as the independent person for the purposes of the ballot.
(3) Any duty falling upon a branch under this section by reason of its being a trade union shall be treated as having been discharged to the extent to which the union of which it is a branch has discharged the duty instead.
(4) The duty of confidentiality in relation to the register of members' names and addresses is, when imposed on a scrutineer or on an independent person, a duty—

(a) not to disclose any name or address in the register except in permitted circumstances, and
(b) to take all reasonable steps to secure that there is no disclosure of any such name or address by any other person except in permitted circumstances,

(5) The circumstances in which disclosure of a member's name and address is permitted are—

(a) where the member consents;
(b) where it is required for the purposes of the discharge of any of the functions of the Certification Officer or of an inspector appointed by him;
(c) where it is required for the purposes of the discharge of any of the functions of the scrutineer or independent person, as the case may be, under the terms of his appointment;
(d) where it is required for the purposes of the investigation of crime or of criminal proceedings.

(6) Any provision of this Part which incorporates the duty of confidentiality as respects the register into the appointment of a scrutineer or an independent person has the effect of imposing that duty on the scrutineer or independent person as a duty owed by him to the trade union.
(7) The remedy for failure to comply with the requirements of this section is by way of application under section 25 (to the Certification Officer) or section 26 (to the court).

The making of an application to the Certification Officer does not prevent the applicant, or any other person, from making an application to the court in respect of the same matter."'—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. Michael Forsyth): I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse): With this it will be convenient to take the following:
Government new clause 7—Ballots for union amalgamations and transfers of engagements: notice and voting papers to be unaccompanied by influential material
Government new clause 8—Ballots: repeal of provisions for financial assistance and use of employers' premises
Government amendments Nos. 56 to 58, 9, 59, 10, 60 to 62 and 11.

Mr. Forsyth: The Government clauses tabled for consideration today, with their consequential amendments, all improve the current law on trade unions and industrial relations and in particular the conduct of ballots.
New clause 6 protects the confidentiality of trade union members when their membership details are disclosed to external organisations in the process of ensuring that ballots are properly conducted. New clause 7 ensures that trade union members will not get propaganda material with voting papers for union merger ballots. New clause 8 will, at the appropriate time, remove obsolete provisions from the statute book.
New clause 6 responds to important points made by hon. Members in Committee on the new requirements that the Bill makes in respect of union ballots. Hon. Members were rightly anxious to protect the confidentiality of union members' names and addresses. It is important that union members have the security of knowing that the ballots held by their union are as fair and democratic as possible. The clauses in the measure that deal with union ballots, like those in previous legislation, aim to give them that confidence.
It is therefore necessary that independent and qualified people are involved in supervising the electoral process, both as scrutineer and as the independent person responsible for storing and distributing ballot papers and counting votes. We are equally concerned, however, that the access to names and addresses which those people must therefore have does not risk compromising the privacy of any individual. I know how such information, in the wrong hands, can be used to harass or menace individuals, for example, women under threat of harassment or prison officers in Northern Ireland.
5 pm
Of course, such people should be confident that their privacy will be properly safeguarded. They are certainly far from unprotected at present. Those who scrutinise union elections must already satisfy criteria that aim to ensure that only responsible people will be appointed and the majority of membership registers that are computerised are, of course, subject to the protections afforded by the Data Protection Act 1984. I should also point out that a union could take it upon itself to ensure that its contract with the scrutineer included a duty of confidentiality.
But I accept the argument that we should take steps to ensure that there is no doubt in the minds of those who have legitimate access to, or a copy of, a union's register that they must in all circumstances and at all times be conscious of their responsibilities in this area. The amendment obliges a union to place a duty of confidentiality on the scrutineer and independent person and offers union members a remedy by means of

application to the certification officer or the court if it fails to do so. The amendment adds to the existing protections that safeguard the confidentiality of individuals and makes the duty of confidentiality abundantly clear.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: When I used to stand for election at the pits in north Derbyshire, before I became a Member of Parliament, ballots were conducted along similar lines to voting in a general election. We had little booths and we got a turnout of 75 per cent. or more on many occasions. Somehow that fact seems to have been forgotten in the arguments about trade union legislation, of which the Bill is another example. I find it strange that the Government are talking about confidentiality for trade unions when only two years ago the Tory party ballot in a Committee Room for the leader of the party, a putative Prime Minister, was conducted, not confidentially, by the 1922 Committee which could see which way Tory Members were voting—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is very wide of the subject.

Mr. Skinner: It wants putting on the record.

Mr. Forsyth: I must say to the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) that it is the first time I have heard such an allegation. The hon. Gentleman will know that the scope of the Bill does not include elections for the leadership of the Conservative party. One difficulty about union ballots such as the hon. Gentleman referred to was that sometimes the number of people voting exceeded the number who might have been expected to do so.

Mr. Skinner: The Minister should give an example.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr. Forsyth: Before the hon. Member for Bolsover gets on his high horse, he might spend a little time studying the proceedings on the Bill and he would find out that the new clause is a direct result of a request from his hon. Friends, who asked that the Bill be amended.

Mr. Skinner: I just wanted to get in a swipe at the Tory party.

Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Gentleman must entertain himself in his own way, but throughout the proceedings on the Bill in Committee hon. Members on both sides tried to improve the legislation to make it more workable and effective. I listened to reasoned arguments which were put to the Government. The new clause is a direct response to the persuasive arguments of the hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Galbraith).

Mr. David Winnick: While I recognise that there were representations on this matter, is the Minister aware that in my trade union, of which I am proud to have been a member for well over 30 years, there were elections from the time the union was set up? Does not the Minister feel any inhibitions about referring to elections in trade unions when he is an active member of a political party which is known to be the least democratic of all the major political parties in western Europe? When is the Tory party going to reform itself and become democratic?

Mr. Forsyth: The Conservative party is not in a position where the clear majority of votes are cast by the trade unions and where people turn up to cast votes on behalf of


millions of other people. I am not prepared to take lectures from the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) on the conduct of political parties. The Bill is not concerned with political parties; it is concerned with trade unions. Trade unions enjoy certain privileges and immunities which political parties do not. In return for those privileges and immunities it is appropriate that there should be a proper framework of law. That is what the Bill is providing.
Indeed, the step-by-step approach that we have taken in the reform of industrial relations has resulted in our seeing the lowest number of days lost through strike action since records began 100 years ago. Had we listened to the advice of the hon. Gentleman, none of those measures would have been brought to the statute book. The hon. Gentleman now finds himself a member of a political party which tells the electorate that it accepts the good sense of much of the legislation which it opposed initially.
On new clause 7, a key principle of the Government's reform of industrial relations and trade union law since 1979 has been our willingness to keep that law under review and to come forward with further measures for reform as and when experience shows them to be needed. The new clause and its associated amendment illustrate that principle in action.
Union merger ballots are important. They affect the very future of a union and its members should have the assurance of a properly conducted, fully postal, and independently scrutinised ballot. Measures already included in the Bill will go a long way towards giving them that assurance. However, during the recent NALGO ballot on merger with other unions to form the proposed new union "UNISON", it became apparent that members needed an additional protection in the case of such ballots. We heard, from various quarters and from several individuals who had brought the matter to the attention of their Members of Parliament, that the NALGO leadership had chosen to send out campaigning material with the actual voting papers themselves. That material was clearly designed to influence voters to cast their votes in favour of the merger. It was one-sided. Given the real division of opinion within the union, it is unsurprising that some members, rightly, felt concerned that the existing law did not prevent that.

Mr. Andrew Miller: I find the Minister's example difficult to understand. In the complexities of union mergers, which will inevitably take place as part of the pattern of change in the structure of trade unions, with a continuing reduction in number over the years, members will want advice as to what is best. Is the Minister saying that he regards it as inappropriate for the elected—I stress "elected"—executive to express a point of view on the merger, or does he regard union members not really as shareholders in the union who should not get opinions from the executive?

Mr. Forsyth: No, I am not saying that. I agree with the hon. Gentleman. The executive should be able to express a view, but I do not think it appropriate for that view to be included with the ballot papers.
The hon. Member for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton) and my hon. Friends the Members for Boothferry (Mr. Davis) and for Ealing, Acton (Sir G. Young), in correspondence with me, relayed concerns expressed to

them about the matter by constituents. I am glad to be able to move the new clause, and its associated amendment, to make changes to the law which will meet those concerns.

Mr. Thomas Graham: Surely the Minister understands that the trade union leadership would come to a decision in favour of a merger for many common sense reasons. Government pressure may dictate what happens to unions. During a ballot, is not it in order for a trade union to ask its members to consider the views of the union leadership? When political parties—including the Conservative party—take decisions, I am sure that they inform their membership of the views of the executive and the leadership. The idea of a trade union leadership informing its members of its views and the reasons for an amalgamation is not too complex to accept. I am sure that the Minister understands what I am saying. The massive bulk of trade union members is likely to wish to hear the leadership's views.

Mr. Forsyth: I do not disagree with the hon. Gentleman. The changes to be made by the new clause and the amendment will not prevent a union from communicating the views of its leadership or anyone else to members. The leadership will continue to be free to communicate such information about any issue. Nor will unions be prevented from giving members the information necessary to judge the main effects of the subject matter of a merger ballot. The law already provides that such information must be made available to voters in a union merger ballot and has done so for many years. That is secured by a notice, approved by the independent certification officer, which unions have always had to prepare in advance of a merger ballot. In future, by virtue of the provisions of schedule 7 to the Bill, that notice will have to be sent out with the merger ballot voting papers as a matter of course.

Ms. Angela Eagle: I am intrigued at the Minister's use of the most recent example of a successful union ballot—UNISON—as when I worked for the Confederation of Health Service Employees, I was involved in the beginnings of that long and arduous process. Will the Minister confirm that he said that there have been three complaints from Members of Parliament responding to their constituents' concerns? Will he tell the House whether there have been any other complaints during that process, which has lasted three years, and, if so, how many?
Will the Minister also confirm that by the time that UNISON comes into existence in April the union membership will be almost 1 million strong? Is he really saying that the Government are willing to legislate because of three complaints out of 1 million?

Mr. Forsyth: A number of changes have been made to the Bill and the law because of matters that the hon. Lady and her hon. Friends mentioned in Committee. The Government listened to the arguments put to them. Three Members of the House—two Conservatives and one Opposition Member—mentioned the matter to me, following complaints from their constituents. We have considered the arguments and it seems appropriate to ensure that unions considering a merger are able to put the views of the executive or the union to the membership. It


is right and proper, however, that one-sided material should not go to members when the ballot papers are sent out.
In elections to the executive, as the hon. Lady knows, there is an opportunity for all candidates to put their views. It is important that a balanced argument should be put across, where that is appropriate.

Mr. Richard Burden: Will the Minister reflect on the fact that before the UNISON merger got near a ballot it had been discussed extensively in union conference after conference by all three unions involved? There had also been extensive branch consultation on the issue. The merger has had more discussion than many of the provisions of the Bill. By enclosing that material, the union executive was doing no more than articulating the views of the membership, which had been expressed all the way through.
Is not it a fact that the Minister does not like the result of that merger ballot? If he does not object to campaign material being circulated, is not the amendment another attempt to make unions spend more money unnecessarily, by having to make two mailings to members when one would suffice?

Mr. Forsyth: I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman should use that argument. Is he arguing that there had been so much discussion in conference and elsewhere that the executive was expressing the views of the membership? In that case, what would be the point of a ballot, which is to ascertain the views of the membership? There should be proper discussion of a merger and opportunities to get the arguments across. Surely the hon. Gentleman can see that it is difficult to understand why the union's view should be presented again at the final stage, when people are asked to vote in the ballot. He argued that there had already been extensive discussions and, on that basis, the membership would already be familiar with the executive's view. I find it extraordinary that the hon. Gentleman cannot understand why it is inappropriate for partisan information to be issued with ballot papers, because he is usually far more perceptive than that.
Whether I approve of the results of the ballot in question is neither here nor there. It is not for me to take a view on whether it is good or bad. It is, however, a good thing for people to receive ballot papers without partisan views attached to them with a paper clip.
New clause 7 provides for a new subsection, (3A), to be added to section 99 of the 1992 Act. It requires a notice about the subject matter of the ballot to be free of any statement
making a recommendation or expressing an opinion about the proposed amalgamation or transfer.
That means that the independent certification officer, who polices the relevant legislation and to whom complaints about breaches of union law must be brought, will not approve any notice which, in his opinion, contains such a statement.
Amendment No. 9 provides that only certain materials may be sent to members. They include the approved notice and the means whereby voters can return their completed voting papers.
Those changes to the Bill are modest but practical and have been prompted by consideration of events which occurred after its publication.
New clause 8 and its consequential amendment repeal sections 115 and 116 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992.
In December, we announced our intention to phase out public subsidy for trade union ballots. The reasoning behind that decision was made clear—with the aim of ballot funding achieved and now that postal balloting on major issues affecting union members is widespread and well accepted, the scheme does not merit continued public subsidy.

Ms. Eagle: The Minister is smiling.

Mr. Forsyth: If the hon. Lady smiles at me, I am always inclined to smile back. If she wishes to intervene, I shall happily give way.
We decided to phase out the scheme over three years and to announce the decision at the earliest opportunity to give trade unions maximum notice and the opportunity to make alternative plans.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: Can the Minister share with the House how much money has been used during each of the past few years and what consultations took place with the party or the trade unions before the Government made the announcement?

Mr. Forsyth: As my hon. Friend will be aware from his experience in Government, there was considerable consultation with members of the Conservative party who were also members of the Government before the announcement was made. The announcement followed the review of public expenditure commitments in the Department. All Government Departments took part in the review as part of the public expenditure survey.
On my hon. Friend's question about the amount spent, if he consults Hansard he will find several written answers, which confirm that the figure was about £4 million during the past two years. I think that it was £4.2 million in 1992.
Once the trade union ballot funding scheme ceases to exist in 1996, the power to establish the scheme will be obsolete. Therefore, we have decided to take the opportunity afforded by the Bill to repeal that redundant power. As the new clause makes clear, the power will remain in force until the phasing-out arrangements are concluded at the end of March 1996.

Mr. Graham: Does the Minister believe that now is the appropriate moment to remove a subsidy of £4.2 million from trade unions? It is a time when trade unions are under pressure from rising unemployment, threats to benefits and now the issue of postal ballots—all the result of Government initiatives. How on earth can the Government have decided that now is the appropriate time? Is not it just another example of the Government putting the boot in?

Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Gentleman must have a cynical view of the Government if he can make such a charge and he must have a short memory. He may recall that when we introduced the scheme to provide for the funding of trade union ballots, we had difficulty persuading the trade unions to accept the money. There was strong opposition to the scheme and great criticism of the trade unions that


chose to accept the money and participate in the balloting procedure when it was voluntary. It is no longer a voluntary, but a statutory, requirement.
I know that the hon. Member for Renfrew, West and Inverclyde (Mr. Graham) works hard on behalf of his constituents and promotes many causes involving public expenditure. If we have to decide between using public funds to subsidise ballots on strike action or using them on the many other worthy causes that the hon. Gentleman draws to the attention of the House, I am sure that he will agree that we are right to consider that the continued funding of the scheme is no longer a priority.

Mr. Burden: In a written answer on 16 December, the Minister clarified that the TUC was informed of the Government's plans to phase out funding of ballots on the same day as the public announcement was made–10 December. On 26 November in Committee the Minister said:
we should not put unreasonable cost burdens on trade unions."—[Official Report, Standing Committee F, 26 November 1992; c. 14]
Does the Minister believe that the proposal would result in a cost burden on trade unions? Does he accept that there could have at least been discussions about whether it was reasonable or unreasonable? Why did not he consult the trade unions before making the announcement?

Mr. Forsyth: I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman studies my words in Committee so carefully.

Mr. Burden: I do so all the time.

Mr. Forsyth: If the hon. Gentleman does so all the time, as he says from a sedentary position, he will also see that I said in Committee—I cannot give the exact words—that I was keen that we should give the Committee the clear position on the future of the ballot funding scheme during our consideration of the Bill. The announcement was made in a manner that enabled the Committee to be aware of the position so that it could consider the subject.
I agree with the hon. Gentleman that, in response to representations by Opposition Members, I said in Committee that we did not wish to add to the cost burdens on trade unions. The hon. Gentleman will note, from his careful study of my words, that I was then referring to the costs of the scrutiny of ballots, not the costs of running ballots. I think that the hon. Gentleman will recognise that my arguments are wholly consistent.

Mr. Winnick: The Minister has a reputation for frankness, but perhaps it is difficult for him to be too frank when presenting the measure. However, does not he realise that we know that the Government loathe and detest trade unions? They can hardly make remarks about trade unions without attacking them. Of all the Ministers, none is more Thatcherite or more dedicated to Thatcherite views than the Minister of State—I suppose that he will take that as a compliment.

Mr. Forsyth: I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his compliment. The second part of his comments may be true, but the first part certainly is not. While at the Department of Employment, I have tried to improve our contacts and relations with trade unions. However, the hon. Gentleman cannot expect the taxpayer to continue to subsidise activities arising from a decision to take

industrial action. If trade unions wish to do that, it is clearly for them to find the funds to meet their legal obligations.
As for being Thatcherite—which I take as a great compliment from the hon. Gentleman—

Mr. Winnick: I was in a generous mood.

Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Gentleman says that he was in a generous mood. On the basis of the attitude that the Labour party has adopted to our trade union reforms—to embrace most of them and refuse to repeal the legislation now in place—the hon. Gentleman must find himself wearing the same mantle as me. I hope that he does so with the same conviction and enthusiasm as he attributes to me.

Mr. Graham: The Minister never told us in Commit tee that the Government were withdrawing about £4·2 million from the balloting procedure and replacing it by funding scrutineers. Is the Minister now saying that the Government are considering funding scrutineers for ballots for trade unions?

Mr. Forsyth: I am saying no such thing. The hon. Gentleman will recall that when we were ensconced in Committee, one issue raised by, I think, the hon. Member for Warley, West (Mr. Speller) was that the cost of employing scrutineers where the number of people involved in the ballot was small would create difficulties. A request was made as to whether we would consider a concession to reduce the burden of costs on trade unions. I gave an undertaking, which has been honoured, to look at that matter with a view to giving assistance. That undertaking was what the hon. Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. Burden) was quoting earlier—I suspect in an attempt to trap me with my own words.

Mr. Robert Ainsworth: rose—

Mr. Forsyth: I shall happily give way to the hon. Gentleman, but I am in danger of filibustering my own new clause.

Mr. Ainsworth: I am loth to impede the Minister's progress, but the Opposition's problem does not arise from the Minister's frankness, as my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) said earlier —quite the contrary. The Minister is attempting to say that the trade unions' position has changed as they did not want to accept Government money when the systems were being introduced on a voluntary basis. Those systems are now being introduced on a compulsary basis, through legislation, in a deliberately over-bureaucratic way. The Government want to legislate to ensure that there are two separate postal circulations on a ballot, but, meanwhile, they have withdrawn the financial support for that process. The Government want to dictate the details of how trade unions should operate and, having done that, withdraw any subsidy. That is the problem and it shows how the Government's anti-trade unionism is creeping in.

Mr. Forsyth: If the Government were anti-trade union and wanted to make life difficult for trade unions, they could have included in the Bill many provisions that they have not. We are not opposed to trade unions; we simply think that they enjoy great privileges and immunities arid that there should be a proper framework of law. We believe that it would be inappropriate to use taxpayers' money to support ballots that are about either internal


trade union matters or causing disruption in the workplace. We have made no attempt to remove the privileges of trade unions or to argue that they should not be able to go about their business.
The ending of the ballot funding scheme also affects section 116 of the 1992 Act, which relates specifically to ballots that meet requirements of a "scheme under section 115". Clearly, once there is no scheme under section 115 —as will be the case once the phasing-out arrangements for the ballot funding scheme are complete—section 116 will inevitably fall. We are therefore taking this opportunity to repeal section 116 as well.
These repeals are consequent on the decision to phase out public subsidy for trade union ballots. The Bill offers a timely opportunity to repeal soon-to-be redundant provisions and, in the interests of keeping statute up to date and as straightforward as possible, we have taken the opportunity to do so.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: When was the funding for trade union training introduced—mainly for health and safety —and what is its current level?

Mr. Forsyth: I shall be happy to answer that question at some point, but we are now discussing funds provided for ballots rather than funds provided for education and training, which are not affected. My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to those arrangements, which are also being phased out. I have asked the Health and Safety Commission to consider how it can improve the provision of training related to safety and we have made it clear that funds would be available for such purposes. If my hon. Friend tables a question, I shall be glad to set out the facts in a written answer.
I commend the new clauses and amendments to the House.

Mr. Sam Galbraith: I welcome the Minister's reassurances about possible increases in funds for training in health and safety. That is a matter of increasing importance. The hon. Gentleman has been particularly mellow this afternoon. I am not sure whether that is due to the sense of relief that we all feel when the Report stage of a Bill is reached, or to the somewhat splendid lunch that we have all had today, but we shall find out as the night progresses.
New clause 6 was tabled in response to representations that we made in Committee. It imposes a statutory obligation of confidentiality on the maintenance of trade union registers. As the Minister said, various statutory regulations under, for instance, data protection legislation would make it difficult for a register to be breached and information given elsewhere. We felt, however, that that protection was not absolute, and that a statutory obligation was required because of the seriousness of the matters involved—especially in relation to security, particularly in Northern Ireland, and to junk mail. We are grateful to the Minister for what he has done in that regard.
New clause 7 can best be described as a piece of unnecessary legislation. Most Opposition Members would agree that it is a bit daft. I understand the Minister's view that only the ballot paper should be sent to trade union

members, so that nothing influences their judgment. However, given that the Government's aim has always been the amalgamation of trade unions and a reduction in their number—indeed, some Opposition Members favour that—it seems particularly perverse not to allow ballot papers to be accompanied by information about the rights and wrongs of a proposed merger. That is not a political issue between left and right; it is about good organisation in trade unions.
It should be borne in mind that information is often provided along with ballot papers for elections to a number of organisations—including, probably, trade unions. Frequently, a curriculum vitae is included. Why should not information be contained in the envelope with the ballot paper? Surely that would be a useful way of conveying such information. The Minister may fear that it would be one-sided, but it would be easy to ensure that both sides were represented. The hon. Gentleman has made an unnecessary meal of the issue, basing his argument on representations from three Members of Parliament who have received an unspecified number of complaints. He has gone over the top to try to solve a problem that, in our view, does not exist. We should encourage the provision of information, so that trade union members can make better choices.
It is, however, to new clause 8 that we are most strongly opposed. As the Minister said, it withdraws payment to trade unions for ballots. It exposes the Government's word to some contempt, suggesting that, to a certain extent, they cannot be trusted. The Minister has said that, at the time when ballot funding was introduced, there was a dispute within trade unions about whether the money should be taken. Indeed, there were many arguments on both sides at that time, but it was consistently said that the measure was temporary: it would never stand the test of time. Once the ballots were introduced, the funds would be withdrawn.
Not at all, said the Government—and, unfortunately, chaps like me who supported the funding said the same. My judgment has been found wanting, which is one of the reasons for my anger at the withdrawal of the funds—which, at the time of their introduction, were supposed to be a continuing commitment. In its 1979 manifesto, the Conservative party—mentioning the matter for the first time—said:
We will … provide public funds for postal ballots".
On Second Reading of the Employment Bill 1979, the then Secretary of State justified the measure by saying that funding would
remove financial obstacles to the holding of postal ballots." —[Official Report, 17 December 1979; Vol. 976, c. 61.]
The Bill, apparently, was telling trade unions:
You do not have to have a secret ballot for any of your decisions. It is up to you. But if you are thinking of having one, you do not have to worry about the cost, for the taxpayer will reimburse you."—[Official Report, 17 December 1979; Vol. 976, c. 165.]
First, secret balloting is a statutory obligation; secondly, the Government consider it an essential part of the framework for the nation's industrial recovery and regeneration—and for good industrial relations—for ballots to be held before strike action, and in a host of other circumstances. If ballots are as important as that, surely it is important for the taxpayer to finance them. The Minister has not justified the removal of funds.
During the Report stage of the Employment Bill, the then Secretary of State said:


the most likely means of achieving our aims, which are so widely shared, is by encouragement and the provision of funds rather than by compulsion."—[Official Report, 22 April 1980; Vol. 983, c. 304.]
All those nice words were said at the time, but, as we now realise, the commitment was only temporary. The Minister has told us that, now that the Government's aims have, in fact, been achieved by compulsion, the money will be taken away.
Once again, the Government's reassurances cannot be trusted. The measure will impose a financial burden on the trade unions—a figure of £4·2 million has been given. The Minister will recall that, in Committee, we spent many happy hours smilingly listening to his talk of burdens. He was never worried about the imposition of burdens on the trade unions, but, whenever we suggested imposing a duty on employers, he said that such a burden was unacceptable. Therefore, we oppose the new clause. It reneges on previous commitments given by the Government. Once again, the Government have applied double standards, under which individual trade unionists and their organisations are treated differently from business men.

Mr. Graham: As my hon. Friend knows, the sum of £4·2 million was provided for this purpose. We are now talking about there being a requirement on every trade union to conduct postal ballots. Has my hon. Friend made an estimate of how much they will cost the unions?

Mr. Galbraith: The Minister might find that an interesting question to answer. I do not know the answer. However, my hon. Friend has brought me to my final point.
The trade union legislation to which I referred increased the statutory duty imposed upon trade unions to conduct ballots. The Minister intends to impose additional statutory obligations that will involve additional expense but he also intends to take away from trade unions the money with which to conduct ballots. That is further evidence of his double standards.
We approve of new clause 6. It meets some of the points that we made in Committee. We think that new clause 7 is daft, unnecessary and over the top. The Government: have over-reacted to what is not a problem. However, we shall not take the trouble to vote against new clause 7.
On new clause 8, however, we believe that the Government have reneged on their previous commitments to trade unions and individual trade union members. For that reason, therefore, we shall vote against new clause 8.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I believe, as do other hon. Members, that new clause 6 is acceptable. The hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Galbraith) has just said that new clause 7 does not matter all that much. I should like, however, to say something about new clause 8.
It would be useful if the Minister could tell the House how much money he expects trade unions to have to spend on postal ballots. There were good arguments for the trade union movement accepting the money that was made available on a voluntary basis. The arguments were long and hard. There was some ill-feeling between the brothers, if I may put it that way, at that time. It then came to be accepted. There are now good arguments for ensuring that that money should continue to be made available for all within the trade union movement.
Now, nobody is compelled to be a member of a trade union. For the Minister suddenly to turn round and say that this abolition is part of a bilateral deal with the Treasury within the public expenditure survey, one of the more private aspects of Government that does not involve Parliament, or the trade union movement, is wrong. Half the trade union members are in trade unions that are not affiliated to the Labour party. The issue affects the Trades Union Congress. The TUC is not affiliated to the Labour party.
The trade unions and the TUC are together trying to put behind them the past apparent total assocation with the Labour party and to establish in the minds of their members and in the mind of Government that they—especially those that are affiliated to the Labour party—can do a better job by not constantly backing losers, as they have done in four general elections in a row.
They have become more open to dialogue and debate, with the result that some of the Government's ideas may be acceptable to the trade union movement, after discussion. Furthermore, many of the ideas of the trade union movement have been accepted by the Government, as we shall find when we consider amendment No. 54, which provides that health and safety representatives should not be sacked for drawing attention to potential dangers to health or safety in the workplace. The Government rejected that concept at one time, but a year ago they accepted it and it is now being consolidated in legislation.
In this case, the Government took an arbitrary decision. There was no consultation with Conservative Members who have an interest in the issue and who would have liked to take part in the debate. There were no consultations with Opposition Members, whether or not they are sponsored by trade unions. To drop it like a bombshell, especially on to those trade unions which found the provision useful, strikes me as wrong.
What is wrong with consultation, discussion and debate? Put like that, the House should vote against the new clause. I hope that those who advise Ministers will remember that the habit, over the decades, of discussing issues in the open and having meetings with the TUC and with representatives of the trade unions, was a perfectly reasonable way of going about things. If, after consultation, the Government decide that their expenditure plans require the saving of £4 million in this way, that may be acceptable, but it is unacceptable without consultation.

Mr. Graham: The hon. Gentleman will recall that at that time there was a lot of consultation with the trade unions. They were asked to accept the money. There were an amazing number of articles in the newspapers by Tory supporters and business men, all urging the trade unions to accept the money. Everyone understood at that time that the money was to be for all time and that therefore there was no need not to have ballots—that they could be put in place and paid for. It was said then that the money would be available for all time. How can any trade union now believe that any legislation introduced by this Government is to be trusted?

Mr. Bottomley: That takes us to a debate that I believe should have taken place before the Government announced their decision rather than now. If, as the Minister said, there will be a requirement that postal


ballots must be held, there is a case to be argued for continuing public funding. We must at least be grateful that there is to be a phasing out of the funding rather than an instant guillotine, but I repeat my point that decisions such as this should not in future be announced in this way.

Mr. Ron Leighton: The hon. Gentleman is making a particularly powerful case as a former Minister at the Department of Employment. He has a unique insight into these issues. Can he give his view of the motives behind the move? Is it to shave £4 million off a £50 billion deficit, or is it a mean, nasty attempt to cripple the trade unions financially?

Mr. Bottomley: It will not cripple the unions financially because not all trade unions have taken advantage of it. There is a debate within the trade union movement as to whether it was right to take the money and whether it is still right to take it. That is a separate set of issues. The key point is that the Government have not been in the habit of taking arbitrary decisions without consultation. I believe that the trade unions should have been consulted. That is why I shall vote against the new clause.

Mr. John Hutton: I shall confine my remarks to new clause 8. It is interesting to note, following the point made by the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), that the new clause was not the subject of advance consultations. That is an important point. I suspect that the reason why there was no advance consulation was that the Government were aware of what the response would be if they did consult. The response from both sides of industry would, I am sure, have been against the abolition of state funding for postal ballots.
It is also worth pointing out that we have not heard a convincing case from the Minister this afternoon as to why state funding for postal ballots should be removed. We have not heard a convincing case because a convincing case cannot be made for it. When the scheme was introduced in 1980, the postal balloting regime introduced by the Act was voluntary. There was no compulsion to hold postal ballots. Postal ballots were the preferred method by means of which trade unions could consult their members, but they were not mandatory.
The important point now is that almost all these ballots must be conducted by post. If we add on to the requirement that ballots should be held that they should all be postal, the Bill adds another layer of bureaucracy and requirements on to unions, for they will have to appoint professional scrutineers. The trade unions will be hit by substantial costs.
The figures from the certification officer reveal that last year £4·2 million was spent on the postal ballot scheme, that £2·6 million was spent on the scheme in 1991 and that £1·5 million was spent on it in 1990. Therefore, we see an exponential increase in the costs that trade unions have to shoulder because of the Government's legislative policy. That financial burden on trade unions will increase in the years to come, not just because postal ballots are now mandatory, but because additional costs will be incurred, due to the requirement to appoint scrutineers. The House is entitled to take the view that this is a rather sad measure.

No convincing case has been made for withdrawing the state funding regime. The Minister has not made such a case this afternoon because no such case can be made.
It is also worth bearing it in mind that when the regime was introduced, the then Secretary of State for Employment said:
it will remove financial obstacles to the holding of postal ballots."—[Official Report, 17 December 1979; Vol. 976, c. 61.]
That was the view of the then Secretary of State of the regime that he proposed should be established. It is logical, therefore, that the withdrawal of the scheme will increase the burdens and obstacles which, I suspect, is precisely what lies behind the new clause. It is a sad mistake. There is no case for it and it will add substantially to the financial burdens on trade unions.
The case has often been made that trade unions are in a special position because of their ability to influence industrial policy and to cause disruption in the workplace. It is therefore argued that there is a special case for requiring unions to ballot their members in certain instances. I agree with that argument. I am and have always have been a strong supporter of balloting within the trade union movement and I support the regime for the reimbursement of the cost of postal ballots.
Having made the balloting arrangement compulsory, why are the Government now proposing to withdraw from it? It has never been declared to be a temporary scheme. Our understanding was that it was permanent because of the special costs involved in administering postal ballots. Trade unions are voluntary organisations. Admittedly, they are in a position to have a special influence on the course of industrial policy but, as the hon. Member for Eltham said, they are voluntary associations. Therefore, there is no case for imposing a mandatory obligation to consult by means of a postal ballot on voluntary organisations and for the Government to then say that the unions must bear the cost on their own. That is grossly unfair and unreasonable.
I am sure that hon. Members of all parties support the case for postal balloting. It is a reasonable way to consult the trade union membership, but, having imposed a mandatory obligation on voluntary associations, it is not reasonable or fair for the Government to withdraw funding just at the moment when they are substantially increasing the costs of the postal balloting scheme.
The Minister referred to the fact that postal balloting is an accepted method of consultation and that, because the process has become accepted, now is the moment for the Government to withdraw funding. There is no logic in the Minister's argument, if that is his case. I draw his attention in particular to the Trade Union Act 1984 which made certain ballots mandatory and compulsory, especially those in connection with strikes and trade union elections. There was no choice about whether those ballots should take place in a particular way. However, the Government still applied the postal balloting funding scheme to those compulsory ballots, so there is no argument in precedent to which the Minister can turn to support his case.
The Minister gave the game away in his opening remarks. It is clear that the reason why the Government are withdrawing from the scheme has nothing to do with the balloting practice, democracy or the question of whether the state should subsidise strike ballots, because it


was the Conservative Government who introduced the notion of subsidy for strike ballots in the first place. It is purely a matter of public expenditure.
The Government have examined the budget and pointed out to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury £4 million that they can lose this year. They proposed to proceed quietly and without consultation and to spring the decision in the middle of the Committee stage in order to save the Department of Employment £4 million this year, probably £6 million the year after and £8 million the year after that. The cost is substantial as we are talking about many millions of pounds. It is pathetic and sad that the Government have tabled the new clause.

Mr. Robert Ainsworth: As has been said, there were differences of opinion during the debates on various pieces of legislation about balloting within trade unions. I readily admit that I never was, and still am not, in favour of compulsory postal ballots, whether or not the Government agree to pay for them. We have reached a point where the deliberate interference in the internal workings of the trade union movement has become unacceptable. That has been widely recognised not only by people within the trade union movement but by the public at large.
On a personal level, I am perhaps not as upset as my hon. Friend the Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Galbraith) who may have accepted the argument in the first place for the introduction of postal ballots and encouraged people to take the Government subsidy. However, I believe that the Government's proposal is run through with cynicism because the Government have no intention of reducing the wholly unreasonable level of interference in trade unions, but are deliberately bringing the full impact of their legislation to bear on them.
It is not only economic problems and the desire to cut public expenditure that is obliging the Government to do so. Vindictiveness runs through the Bill, and there is clearly a desire to punish the trade union movement. It is absolutely beyond me why the Government cannot break out of that mindset. Although it seems that one or two Conservative Members can, members of the Government Front Bench cannot.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: Would it not be a good idea to consider asking the Government whether they will allow trade union subscriptions to have, in effect, tax relief at source? At the moment, many trade union members do not apply for it. It would save bother with the Inland Revenue, would help to raise money for the trade unions to pay for the ballot and would probably make more money than if they kept the £4 million.

Mr. Ainsworth: I had not thought of that proposal, but I stand by the general proposition that the trade unions should be accepted as independent organisations. If the Government get involved in such legislative detail, they should be prepared to pay for it. I do not believe that they should get involved with such detail in the first place but that they should leave the trade union movement to organise itself in accordance with certain criteria.
I have always believed that the prime aim of conducting a ballot of members was to gain the maximum participation in the decision-making process. There is clear evidence that in a wide range of decisions postal ballots do not achieve that aim. They were never intended to do so.

Well organised factory branch ballots are the way to maximise participation in trade union decisions, whether about strikes or other matters.
Factory branch ballots are a good, efficient and cheap way for people to participate. They were made illegal by the Government who are now withdrawing the funding in order to meddle in the internal organisation of trade unions. For that reason, I deplore the new clause which is vindictive in the extreme.

Mr. Miller: I should like to ask the Minister a simple question.
Sections 115 and 116 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 deals with two effects. The first is the main principle that we have discussed and the second is the use of employers' premises. Section 115 describes the purposes for which the ballots are to take place. One involves strike action and the other deals with
the acceptance or rejection of a proposal made by an employer in relation to the contractual terms … upon which, or the other incidents of the relationship whereby, a person works or provides services for the employer".
Does the Minister not think that, in his haste to save £4 million or, as I see it, to make life more difficult for the trade union movement, he is putting at risk good industrial relations which could be affected by the removal of a statutory obligation, in certain circumstances, to conduct ballots in the workplace?

Mr. Winnick: Does my hon. Friend accept that the Government are not really concerned with good industrial relations and they are certainly not concerned with any financial problems that trade unions may have? The Government forced on trade unions one type of voting. As I said earlier, the trade unions require no lectures about internal voting. Unlike the Conservative party, all unions have voting systems. The Bill aims to make it far more difficult for trade unions to operate. It is motivated by spite, as has been the case since 1979, and I hope—I am sure that my hopes are well founded—that my hon. Friend has no illusions whatever about what the Government are trying to do in eroding and undermining trade union rights, banning trade unions outright, as at Government Communications Headquarters, and in other places making it extremely difficult for working people to belong to trade unions at their place of work.

6 pm

Mr. Miller: My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. It is for the Minister to demonstrate that he is not so cynical towards trade unions as my hon. Friend believes. Having spent many years as a trade union official and three months in Committee, I share my hon. Friend's worries. If the Minister is genuinely concerned about the conduct of good industrial relations, and bearing in mind that the new clause will damage industrial relations by damaging workplace provisions that are set out in clause 116, would it not be better to drop the daft idea to claw back a few million pounds?

Mr. Michael Forsyth: We have had an interesting debate and I shall try to deal with some of the points that have arisen.
I found myself listening to Opposition Members wanting to take me back to 1979 and I was rather puzzled by some of the comments that were made. Unfortunately, the former Member for Dunbartonshire, East, now the hon. Member for Cumbernauld and Kilsyth (Mr. Hogg),


was not able to participate in our proceedings in Committee, although I understand that he is now back in harness in the House and I hope that he will forgive me for referring to him. What he said on 17 December 1979 as an Opposition Member is rather instructive when one compares it with some of the comments made by Opposition Members and one of my hon. Friends here today. He said:
I cannot understand why the Government propose that money should be spent in this way.
He was referring to ballots—
The trade union movement has not asked for it, and there is no evidence that the trade union movement cannot afford to run secret ballots.—[Official Report, 17 December 1979; Vol. 976, c. 121.]
In addition, we have seen various reports from the TUC. In 1981 the TUC said:
The general council reaffirmed their policy that affiliated unions should not seek state funds under the Act to finance ballots.
In 1982 the TUC said:
Affiliated unions shall observe congress policy and not seek to accept public funds for union ballots under the Employment Act 1980 ballot funds scheme.
My hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) was unkind to suggest that the Government were being precipitate. The matter is being phased out over a period to 1996. It does not require legislation to do so. The Bill does not withdraw the funding; it merely withdraws the power to provide funding. The funding would have gone in any case. That is not a legal opinion and I am confident that I shall be able to repeat it with conviction tomorrow and the day after.
Opposition Members will find it difficult to argue the case in the House for items of expenditure which are important to them in the health service or elsewhere while at the same time arguing that the Government should continue to subsidise, for example, ballots on industrial action. That is a matter which should not be a priority charge on the taxpayer.
My hon. Friend the Member for Eltham asked me to estimate how much trade unions will spend on such ballots. The Government hope that the expenditure will be minimal because we do not want to see ballots on strikes. We want industrial relations conducted in a way which avoids such things.
It is perverse for the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Mr. Miller), who made so many splendid contributions in Committee, to sully his record now by suggesting that industrial relations will be helped by the taxpayer subsidising ballots to hold strikes.
The hon. Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Ainsworth) said that the new clause was all about a desire to punish the trade unions. I do not believe that he, in his heart of hearts, believes that. He recognises that the Government have to make choices and decide priorities and that it is difficult to justify such expenditure at present.
Opposition Members have expressed their views cogently and I hope that they will understand why, given the current restraints on public expenditure, the Government do not believe that it would be appropriate for funds to be used in this way.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause read a Second time, and added to the Bill.

New clause 7

BALLOTS FOR UNION AMALGAMATION AND TRANSFERS OF ENGAGEMENTS: NOTICE AND VOTING PAPERS TO BE UNACCOMPANIED BY INFLUENTIAL MATERIAL

`In section 99 of the 1992 Act (notice relating to proposed amalgamation or transfer), after subsection (3), there shall be inserted—
(3A) The notice shall not contain any statement making a recommendation or expressing an opinion about the proposed amalgamation or transfer." '—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.

New clause 8

BALLOTS: REPEAL OF PROVISIONS FOR FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE AND USE OF EMPLOYERS' PREMISES

'.—(1) Sections 115 and 116 of the 1992 Act (financial assistance towards expenditure on certain ballots and obligations of employers to make premises available) shall cease to have effect.
(2) No application under regulations under section 115 (whether made before or after its repeal) shall be entertained by the Certification Officer in relation to expenditure in respect of a ballot if the date of the ballot falls after 31 March 1996 or in respect of arrangements to hold a ballot which is not proceeded with if the date of the ballot would have fallen after that date; but, for the purposes of applications made after (as well as before) the repeal in relation to expenditure not excluded by this subsection, the regulations shall continue in force notwithstanding the repeal.
(3) In subsection (2) above, the "date of the ballot" means, in the case of a ballot in which votes may be cast on more than one day, the last of those days.
(4) Subsection (1) above shall come into force on 1 April 1996.'—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Motion made, and Question put, That the clause be read a Second time:—

The House divided: Ayes 300, Noes 250.

Division No. 151]
[6.05 pm


AYES


Adley, Robert
Blackburn, Dr John G


Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)
Body, Sir Richard


Aitken, Jonathan
Booth, Hartley


Alexander, Richard
Boswell, Tim


Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)
Bowden, Andrew


Allason, Rupert (Torbay)
Bowis, John


Amess, David
Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes


Ancram, Michael
Brandreth, Gyles


Arbuthnot, James
Brazier, Julian


Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)
Bright, Graham


Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)
Brooke, Rt Hon Peter


Ashby, David
Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)


Aspinwall, Jack
Browning, Mrs. Angela


Atkins, Robert
Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)


Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)
Burns, Simon


Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)
Burt, Alistair


Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)
Butcher, John


Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)
Butler, Peter


Baldry, Tony
Butterfill, John


Banks, Matthew (Southport)
Carlisle, John (Luton North)


Banks, Robert (Harrogate)
Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)


Bates, Michael
Carrington, Matthew


Batiste, Spencer
Carttiss, Michael


Bellingham, Henry
Cash, William


Bendall, Vivian
Channon, Rt Hon Paul


Beresford, Sir Paul
Chapman, Sydney


Biffen, Rt Hon John
Clappison, James






Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)
Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey
Howard, Rt Hon Michael


Coe, Sebastian
Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)


Congdon, David
Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)


Conway, Derek
Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)


Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)
Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)


Coombs, Simon (Swindon)
Hunter, Andrew


Cope, Rt Hon Sir John
Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas


Couchman, James
Jack, Michael


Cran, James
Jackson, Robert (Wantage)


Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)
Jenkin, Bernard


Davies, Quentin (Stamford)
Jessel, Toby


Day, Stephen
Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey


Deva, Nirj Joseph
Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)


Devlin, Tim
Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)


Dickens, Geoffrey
Jopling, Rt Hon Michael


Dicks, Terry
Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine


Dorrell, Stephen
Key, Robert


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Kilfedder, Sir James


Dover, Den
King, Rt Hon Tom


Duncan, Alan
Knapman, Roger


Duncan-Smith, Iain
Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)


Dunn, Bob
Knight, Greg (Derby N)


Durant, Sir Anthony
Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)


Dykes, Hugh
Kynoch, George (Kincardine)


Eggar, Tim
Lait, Mrs Jacqui


Elletson, Harold
Lamont, Rt Hon Norman


Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter
Lang, Rt Hon Ian


Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)
Lawrence, Sir Ivan


Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)
Legg, Barry


Evans, Roger (Monmouth)
Lennox-Boyd, Mark


Evennett, David
Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)


Faber, David
Lidington, David


Fabricant, Michael
Lightbown, David


Fenner, Dame Peggy
Lilley, Rt Hon Peter


Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)
Lord, Michael


Fishburn, Dudley
Luff, Peter


Forman, Nigel
Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas


Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)
MacGregor, Rt Hon John


Forth, Eric
MacKay, Andrew


Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman
Maclean, David


Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)
McLoughlin, Patrick


Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)
McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick


Freeman, Roger
Madel, David


French, Douglas
Maitland, Lady Olga


Fry, Peter
Major, Rt Hon John


Gale, Roger
Malone, Gerald


Gallie, Phil
Mans, Keith


Gardiner, Sir George
Marland, Paul


Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan
Marlow, Tony


Garnier, Edward
Marshall, John (Hendon S)


Gill, Christopher
Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)


Gillan, Cheryl
Martin, David (Portsmouth S)


Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair
Mawhinney, Dr Brian


Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles
Mellor, Rt Hon David


Gorman, Mrs Teresa
Merchant, Piers


Gorst, John
Milligan, Stephen


Grant, Sir Anthony (Cambs SW)
Mills, Iain


Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)
Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)


Greenway, John (Ryedale)
Moate, Sir Roger


Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)
Monro, Sir Hector


Grylls, Sir Michael
Moss, Malcolm


Hague, William
Needham, Richard


Hamilton, Rt Hon Archie (Epsom)
Nelson, Anthony


Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)
Neubert, Sir Michael


Hanley, Jeremy
Newton, Rt Hon Tony


Hargreaves, Andrew
Nicholls, Patrick


Harris, David
Nicholson, David (Taunton)


Haselhurst, Alan
Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)


Hawkins, Nick
Norris, Steve


Hawksley, Warren
Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley


Hayes, Jerry
Oppenheim, Phillip


Heald, Oliver
Ottaway, Richard


Heathcoat-Amory, David
Page, Richard


Hendry, Charles
Paice, James


Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael
Patnick, Irvine


Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.
Patten, Rt Hon John


Hill, James (Southampton Test)
Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey


Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)
Pawsey, James


Horam, John
Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth





Pickles, Eric
Sweeney, Walter


Porter, Barry (Wirral S)
Sykes, John


Porter, David (Waveney)
Tapsell, Sir Peter


Portillo, Rt Hon Michael
Taylor, Ian (Esher)


Powell, William (Corby)
Taylor, John M. (Solihull)


Rathbone, Tim
Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)


Redwood, John
Temple-Morris, Peter


Renton, Rt Hon Tim
Thomason, Roy


Richards, Rod
Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)


Riddick, Graham
Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)


Robathan, Andrew
Thornton, Sir Malcolm


Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn
Thurnham, Peter


Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)
Townend, John (Bridlington)


Robinson, Mark (Somerton)
Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)


Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)
Tracey, Richard


Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)
Tredinnick, David


Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela
Trend, Michael


Ryder, Rt Hon Richard
Twinn, Dr Ian


Sackville, Tom
Vaughan, Sir Gerard


Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim
Waldegrave, Rt Hon William


Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas
Walden, George


Shaw, David (Dover)
Walker, Bill (N Tayside)


Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)
Waller, Gary


Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian
Ward, John


Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)
Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)


Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)
Waterson, Nigel


Shersby, Michael
Watts, John


Sims, Roger
Wells, Bowen


Skeet, Sir Trevor
Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John


Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)
Whitney, Ray


Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)
Whittingdale, John


Soames, Nicholas
Widdecombe, Ann


Speed, Sir Keith
Wiggin, Sir Jerry


Spencer, Sir Derek
Willetts, David


Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)
Wilshire, David


Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)
Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)


Spink, Dr Robert
Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)


Spring, Richard
Wolfson, Mark


Sproat, Iain
Wood, Timothy


Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John
Yeo, Tim


Steen, Anthony
Young, Sir George (Acton)


Stephen, Michael



Stewart, Allan
Tellers for the Ayes:


Streeter, Gary
Mr. Timothy Kirkhope and


Sumberg, David
Mr. Robert G. Hughes.


NOES


Abbott, Ms Diane
Burden, Richard


Adams, Mrs Irene
Byers, Stephen


Ainger, Nick
Caborn, Richard


Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)
Callaghan, Jim


Allen, Graham
Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)


Alton, David
Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)


Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)
Campbell-Savours, D. N.


Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)
Cann, Jamie


Armstrong, Hilary
Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)


Ashton, Joe
Chisholm, Malcolm


Austin-Walker, John
Clapham, Michael


Banks, Tony (Newham NW)
Clark, Dr David (South Shields)


Barron, Kevin
Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)


Bayley, Hugh
Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)


Beckett, Margaret
Clelland, David


Beggs, Roy
Clwyd, Mrs Ann


Bell, Stuart
Coffey, Ann


Benn, Rt Hon Tony
Connarty, Michael


Bennett, Andrew F.
Cook, Robin (Livingston)


Benton, Joe
Corbett, Robin


Berry, Dr. Roger
Corbyn, Jeremy


Betts, Clive
Corston, Ms Jean


Blair, Tony
Cousins, Jim


Blunkett, David
Cox, Tom


Boateng, Paul
Cryer, Bob


Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)
Cummings, John


Boyce, Jimmy
Cunliffe, Lawrence


Boyes, Roland
Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)


Bradley, Keith
Cunningham, Dr John (C'p'l'nd)


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Dafis, Cynog


Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)
Dalyell, Tam


Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)
Darling, Alistair


Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)
Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)






Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)
Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)


Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)
Llwyd, Elfyn


Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'I)
Loyden, Eddie


Denham, John
Lynne, Ms Liz


Dewar, Donald
McAllion, John


Dixon, Don
McCartney, Ian


Dobson, Frank
Macdonald, Calum


Donohoe, Brian H.
McFall, John


Dowd, Jim
McKelvey, William


Dunnachie, Jimmy
Mackinlay, Andrew


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
McLeish, Henry


Eagle, Ms Angela
McNamara, Kevin


Eastham, Ken
Madden, Max


Etherington, Bill
Mahon, Alice


Ewing, Mrs Margaret
Mandelson, Peter


Fatchett, Derek
Marek, Dr John


Faulds, Andrew
Marshall, David (Shettleston)


Field, Frank (Birkenhead)
Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)


Fisher, Mark
Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)


Flynn, Paul
Martlew, Eric


Foster, Derek (B'p Auckland)
Maxton, John


Foster, Don (Bath)
Meale, Alan


Foulkes, George
Michael, Alun


Fraser, John
Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)


Fyfe, Maria
Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll Bute)


Galbraith, Sam
Milburn, Alan


Galloway, George
Miller, Andrew


Gapes, Mike
Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)


Garrett, John
Molyneaux, Rt Hon James


Gerrard, Neil
Moonie, Dr Lewis


Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Morgan, Rhodri


Godman, Dr Norman A.
Morley, Elliot


Godsiff, Roger
Morris, Rt Hon A. (Wy'nshawe)


Golding, Mrs Llin
Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)


Gordon, Mildred
Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)


Gould, Bryan
Mowlam, Marjorie


Graham, Thomas
Mullin, Chris


Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)
Murphy, Paul


Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)
Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon


Grocott, Bruce
O'Brien, Michael (N W'kshire)


Gunnell, John
O'Brien, William (Normanton)


Hain, Peter
O'Hara, Edward


Hall, Mike
Olner, William


Hanson, David
O'Neill, Martin


Hardy, Peter
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley


Harvey, Nick
Pendry, Tom


Henderson, Doug
Pickthall, Colin


Heppell, John
Pike, Peter L.


Hill, Keith (Streatham)
Pope, Greg


Hinchliffe, David
Powell, Ray (Ogmore)


Hoey, Kate
Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)


Howarth, George (Knowsley N)
Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)


Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)
Primarolo, Dawn


Hoyle, Doug
Purchase, Ken


Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)
Quin, Ms Joyce


Hughes, Roy (Newport E)
Radice, Giles


Hughes, Simon (Southwark)
Randall, Stuart


Hutton, John
Raynsford, Nick


Ingram, Adam
Redmond, Martin


Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)
Reid, Dr John


Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)
Robertson, George (Hamilton)


Jamieson, David
Roche, Mrs. Barbara


Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)
Rogers, Allan


Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)
Rooker, Jeff


Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)
Rooney, Terry


Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)
Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)


Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)
Rowlands, Ted


Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)
Salmond, Alex


Jowell, Tessa
Sheerman, Barry


Keen, Alan
Shore, Rt Hon Peter


Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)
Short, Clare


Khabra, Piara S.
Skinner, Dennis


Kilfoyle, Peter
Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)


Kinnock, Rt Hon Neil (Islwyn)
Smith, C. (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)


Kirkwood, Archy
Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)


Leighton, Ron
Smyth, Rev Martin (Belfast S)


Lestor, Joan (Eccles)
Snape, Peter


Lewis, Terry
Soley, Clive


Litherland, Robert
Spearing, Nigel


Livingstone, Ken
Spellar, John





Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)
Watson, Mike


Steinberg, Gerry
Welsh, Andrew


Stevenson, George
Wicks, Malcolm


Strang, Dr. Gavin
Wigley, Dafydd


Straw, Jack
Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)


Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)
Wilson, Brian


Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)
Winnick, David


Tipping, Paddy
Wise, Audrey


Trimble, David
Worthington, Tony


Turner, Dennis
Wright, Dr Tony


Vaz, Keith



Walley, Joan
Tellers for the Noes:


Wardell, Gareth (Gower)
Mr. Eric Illsley and


Wareing, Robert N
Mr. Gordon McMaster.

Question accordingly agreed to.

New clause 3

REPORT TO PARLIAMENT ON PAY AND WORKING CONDITIONS

'.—(1) The Secretary of State shall present annually to both Houses of Parliament a report on the pay and working conditions of employees in industries formerly covered by wages councils and in the security and private residential care industries, after having consulted the Trades Union Congress, the Confederation of British Industry, the representatives of employers and employees in the industries concerned and such bodies concerned with low pay and equal opportunities as he shall think fit.
(2) The first such report shall be presented within 12 months of the day on which Royal Assent to this Act is given.'.—[Mr. Dobson.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Mr. Frank Dobson: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to take new clause 12—Protection for workers in former wages council industries—
'—. Should the abolition of wages councils lead to wage increases in former wages council industries falling behind the pay increases recorded in the Index of Average Earnings published with the monthly unemployment figures for two successive years, it shall be the duty of the Secretary of State to present a report to Parliament giving details of the relevant wage rates and what action he proposes to take to secure the restoration of the value of pay settlements in former wages council industries.'.

Mr. Dobson: The Bill proposes the abolition of wages councils, which set minimum wages for 2,700,000 of the worst paid people in Britain. They are employed mainly in the hotel, catering, retail and hairdressing industries, and about 2 million of them are women. Apparently, they have got to make sacrifices to save the British economy. The Government propose no action on City fraudsters, no action on currency speculators, and no action on property speculators, but the country is in a bad way so the lowest paid are to be paid even less than they are being paid now. It was not people serving in shops or hotels and it was not young women doing hairdressing who were selling the pound short last September or who are selling it short this week. They are the victims of Tory policies and they are being made to suffer.
It is worth pointing out that the highest wages council hourly rate is the somewhat unprincely sum of £3.10. It is our view that the abolition of wages councils will reduce wages. The wages councils set minimum pay, and if that


minimum pay floor is taken away people will fall through. The people employed in the industries involved fear that, the Government advocate it, the supporters of the abolition of wages councils say that that is why they want it, and there is no reason to believe that anything else will happen but that people's minimum wages will fall.
It will not be just minimum wages that fall either, because the big hotel groups have said that they do not mind paying people £2.98 an hour—which is very generous of them—but the problem is that they have to pay their supervisors so much more. So we can bet that supervisors' pay will go down when the minimum wage goes down for other people.
As was shown by the Greater Manchester Low Pay Unit's study of what happened to pay for young people in Greater Manchester, when wages council coverage of under-21s was withdrawn their relative pay went down.
In London now, for reasons that I do not understand, chemist shops are not covered as other shops are by the retailing minimum wage set by the wages councils. That wage is about £3, but jobs for chemist shop assistants are being advertised in London at £2.50. So we can see where retailing pay is going in London.

Mr. Dennis Turner: On the question of retail pay in London, would my hon. Friend care to reflect on the hypocrisy of top directors working in the retail industries? At Allied-Lyons, for instance, the top director's salary is £369,000; at Forte it is £249,000. That is the sort of sums these people are taking out of the retail industry. Will my hon. Friend reflect on those figures when he is talking about minimum wages, and would he like to comment on the morality and fairness of talking to the Government about introducing a maximum wage to take some of this money from those people who are taking too much out of society?

Mr. Dobson: The rules of order which limit what we are allowed to say rather curtail the expression of my real views concerning some of the people who line their pockets by paying themselves half a million pounds a year and then write letters to the Secretary of State for Employment saying that it caused difficulties for their companies' hotels when wages went up by 4 per cent. to less than £3 an hour. Cant and hypocrisy go nowhere near describing them.
The other problem with the abolition of wages councils is that it will be particularly damaging to women's pay. The great advantage of the wages councils from their inception was that they were unisex and awarded the same hourly rate to people working full time and people working part time. As a consequence, the gap between the average pay of men and the average pay of women is much lower in wages councils trades than it is in other trades.
It is shocking to me that the Secretary of State for Employment, who has been given the task, so we are told, of trying to promote equal opportunities in this country, is not concerned by the likelihood of what will happen to wages in wages councils industries and the way that women are likely to suffer. This is what the Equal Opportunities Commission has to say:
If wages councils are abolished without alternative measures such as strengthening the Equal Pay Act, the pay gap, already wider than in most other EC countries, will increase, making it even more difficult for women to achieve economic independence and to provide for their future in old age.
That is the Equal Opportunities Commission's view, and I am sure that it is right. I believe that the Secretary of

State, who is responsible for the Equal Opportunities Commission, should have taken a bit more notice of that and a bit less notice of the ideologues in the Tory party who have been driving this through.
Then there are wages which prevail in other industries not covered by wages councils but which are notorious low payers. There is the well-known security industry, as my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Ainsworth) pointed out in Committee. He cited an advertisement in Coventry for somebody to work as a security guard at £1.80 an hour and to "provide your own dog". That is the sort of wage that these people are talking of providing.
There are also private residential homes where a lot of very vulnerable people are supposed to be properly looked after. Following the excellent "Cutting Edge" programme on TV last night, which exposed the situation in north Lancashire with regard to underpayment, the Low Pay Unit has received approaches from many people throughout the country. It received a telephone call today from a nursing home care assistant who is being paid £1.25 an hour. That is a disgrace. It is a disgrace that employment Ministers are prepared to countenance such things, that social security Ministers are willing to provide finance to such places and that health Ministers are prepared to countenance people being paid such rates for providing vital care for old and vulnerable people. I do not believe that proper standards of care are likely to be provided by people who are so desperate that they have to accept a rate of £1.25 an hour.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: I saw the programme and I have asked the wages inspectorate to look into the two cases which were identified. Does not the hon. Gentleman think it odd that in three months the journalist, the researcher and the production team managed to find only three cases of underpayment, one of which was resolved immediately? Does he not also think it odd that the programme makers did not ask the wages inspectorate to examine the two unresolved cases of underpayment shown in the programme?

Mr. Dobson: I find that extraordinary. Whether or not I disagree with the Minister, I usually have some time for his intelligence, but that is one of the daftest interventions he must have made in his life. How could the young women have fitted in more underpayments except by working and discovering that the jobs were underpaid or, in one case, that she did not get paid at all unless she went loping along to the owner of the cleaning company at his grand residence in Liverpool? The Minister may recall that she had to spend quite some time going to the nursing home owner's vast ranch next to the golf course in Blackburn. When she tried to get the money that he owed her, she was told that she could not see him because he was on holiday in the Caribbean and she could see him when he got back three weeks later. So it took three weeks.
Is the Minister suggesting that anyone should depend on the wages inspectorate to do anything to help people in those industries? Will the Minister guarantee that the employers who are underpaying will be prosecuted?

Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Gentleman has to address the point I was making. If the programme makers were concerned about low-paid people, and if their argument


was that the existing system with the wages inspectorate should be retained in order to provide protection, does he not find it odd that none of the cases identified by the programme makers was reported to the wages inspectorate so that they could be investigated?
As to the hon. Gentleman's specific point, I will happily say that the matter will be properly investigated, and if the wages inspectorate finds that there has been a breach of the law it will make the appropriate recommendations. However, the wages inspectorate informs me that the vast majority of employers meet their obligations and, of course, the vast majority of people are paid well above the minimum level.
The hon. Gentleman must address my point, which he has sidelined. Why does he think that programme makers who are supposedly committed to the cause of maintaining the wages inspectorate and wages councils did not even bother to report the cases for proper investigation by the system that they are arguing to retain?

Mr. Dobson: The programme makers were making a programme; they were not running an operation to suit the Minister and did not want to be diverted by going along to the wages inspectorate. They made an effective programme which had a great impact, and I am glad that it had.
The Minister makes it sound as if the wages inspectorate goes around vigorously looking into things and prosecuting all the cases of wrongdoing that it finds. However, only one in 1,000 cases gets to court. Is that not the figure?

Mr. Forsyth: Last year, a record number of cases were brought to court, far more than were ever brought under the last Labour Government. Employers are often unaware of their obligations and, as the hon. Gentleman knows, the wages inspectorate operates by means of persuasion and without redress to legal measures, and when it finds clear examples of abuse it prosecutes. If the hon. Gentleman is criticising the level of prosecutions, in 1991 we had a record level, considerably higher than anything under the last Labour Government. The Labour Government's record of prosecutions was considerably less than the current level, and it also abolished wages councils, so the hon. Gentleman is trying to make bricks without straw.

Mr. Dobson: I return to the point that the wages council system is not working as well as it should. I am not its greatest supporter. I believe that the system needs to be strengthened and extended. We made that point in Committee.

Ms. Eagle: Will my hon. Friend comment on the fact that the wages council inspectorate's decisions for the north-west in 1991 revealed that 1,083 establishments were underpaying and that there was only one prosecution that year? Will he also comment on the fact that our legislation providing protection against unfair dismissal is now so weak and inadequate, thanks to the Government's dismantling of that protection, that many people currently in low-paid jobs are simply too frightened to report underpayment?

Mr. Dobson: I agree with my hon. Friend. I was quoting the figures for the north-west when I said that there was one prosecution in 1,000 cases.
The Minister said that the employers apparently did not know what their legal obligations were; but employers should know their legal obligations. The Minister is always ranting on about trade unions knowing their legal obligations, so if paid officials of unions are supposed to know, why not people running companies? If they do not, whose fault is it? It is the fault either of the employers or of the Department of Employment and the wages inspectorate for not getting the information through to them. They must take the blame and it is no good the Minister trying to slough it off on other people. Ignorance is no defence. That is a basic principle in English law, and I think in Scottish law as well.
No one can live on the appalling wages that are being paid. I shall quote a very limited number of examples of low pay that the Low Pay Unit has received by telephone today as the result of last night's excellent programme. They include a hairdresser getting £2.39 an hour and being underpaid by £30 a week; a shop worker being paid £2.32 an hour and being underpaid by £31 a week; a 17-year-old working in a butcher's shop for £1.37p an hour and a 19-year-old hairdresser getting £1.50 an hour. That is the demi-paradise in which the Tories have got Britain at the moment. That is their beau ideal. That is how we will compete with the world—by paying people pathetic poverty wages which are demeaning to them and should be demeaning to any Minister of the Crown with any responsibility for it. If the Minister was not ashamed when he watched the film last night, he has lost all sense of shame.
Most of the people who work for those wages are extremely poor and have to fall back on the taxpayer as people on low pay are sometimes entitled to benefit. If their wages are cut, they will be entitled to more benefit, so two groups of people are picking up the price of lining the pockets of Tory supporters who want the abolition of wages councils—the people who will be impoverished by low wages, and the taxpayer who will have to dip into his pocket or her handbag to make up for some of the money that has been taken away.
Who favours abolition? Certainly some free-market freaks, some friends of the Tory party and some people who fall into both categories. There are some notorious contributors to Tory party funds who are strong supporters of the abolition of wages councils. It is a kick-back for putting money into the Tory election fund. It is at the expense of the badly off and the taxpayer.
My hon. Friend referred to the examples of Forte, Allied-Lyons, Whitbread and Scottish and Newcastle Breweries. They paid more than £250,000 to Tory party funds in the most recent year for which the information is available. The lowest paid of the top directors in those companies took home £271,000 in a year, and they all think that £3.10 an hour threatens the future of their companies. They need some attention from some people. They have a lot of explaining to do, especially those in the hotel chains. I ask the directors in the hotel chains or the Minister to give me an explanation.
Why are British hotels more expensive than French hotels, although the wages for French hotel workers are higher than those for British hotel workers? What is wrong? Why are we not competing with the French in hotel prices? If there is any logic in the Minister's case, we


should be providing hotel spaces at cheaper prices than the French do, but we do not. We end up charging people more because the bosses pay themselves much more and property speculators still make enormous profits out of most hotel developments. That is where much of the money is going.
Apparently, the Tories believe that there should be no such thing as a minimum wage. They want to leave it to a bargain between the employer and the employee. When wages councils were introduced, Winston Churchill—then a Liberal but with the support of the Conservatives because there was not a vote against the introduction of wages councils—said:
Where…you have a powerful organisation on both sides…you have a healthy bargaining which increases the competitive power of industry and then forces a progressive standard of life. But where…you have no organisation, no parity of bargaining, the good employer is undercut by the bad and the bad employer is undercut by the worst.
That was true then and it is true today.
In Standing Committee, what did we get from the Minister when he was provoked by my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms. Eagle)? My hon. Friend said:
I still await an answer to my question about how low the Conservative party thinks it is reasonable for wages to fall.
The response from the Minister ended with the magic words:
The hon. Lady cannot stand the idea that people should be free to choose for themselves their terms and conditions."—[Official Report, Standing Committee F, 28 January 1993; c. 605.]
Winston Churchill talked about
a powerful organisation on both sides
and "parity of bargaining". Let the Minister consider what parity of bargaining there is in my constituency when somebody who has slept in a cardboard box all night, because the Government's policies have not found him or her anywhere to live, goes to one of the hotels owned by Grand Metropolitan or Forte—multi-million pound organisations with multi-million pound profits every year—and bargains for a job in the kitchen in London where 60 people chase every job. Is that
a powerful organisation on both sides"?
Are those people who scrape out of their cardboard boxes and look for work powerful? I suggest that they are not; but the people whom they are trying to get jobs from are powerful.
The "Cutting Edge" programme last night revealed that this does not apply simply in London. That young woman, admittedly working for a television programme, was basically forced to beg, bow and scrape to get any job at all and scarcely got enough money to pay the rent even when she did secure one. What a collection of lawbreakers we had on that programme last night.
The Tories say that wages councils lose jobs. There is no possible justification for that statement. If the minimum rates of wages councils lead to the loss of jobs, why has the number of people working in wages council industries in the past three years increased by 90,000 while at the same time the total number of people employed in other industries has decreased by no fewer than 1,364,000? If there is any logic, sense or merit in the Minister's argument, the fall in the number of people employed in wages council industries would have been greater than the fall in other industries. But it has increased in wages council industries while it has fallen in all those industries in which there is no minimum wage.
The other argument of the Tories is that one needs to pay low pay to secure prosperity. That is typical Tory gibberish. If one looks around the world, two things go in parallel: high pay goes with prosperity and low pay goes with poverty. That has always been the case and it always will be the case. Paying poverty-level wages is no way out of Britain's problems.
Apparently, that is the new Tory approach. The Tories have decided that we must compete with the third world and that the way to do that is to have a sort of DIY third world. We are introducing third world pay, work practices, hours and working conditions in Britain. That is shameful.
6.45 pm
The Labour party believes that everyone who wants a job should have one, and that when they have that job they should be able to earn their keep. They should not have to struggle in poverty or depend on benefits when they have been to work. If people have worked a full-time working week, they should be able to maintain themselves and bring up themselves and their family without being dependent on benefits or anything else from anyone. That is what all of us have wanted to do, and most of us have managed to achieve it. We are glad to do it, and we believe that it should apply to everybody else. Everyone should be able to pay his way and look after himself.
I am not the only one who says that. This is a quotation from someone who is well favoured amongst some Conservative Members. In "The Wealth of Nations" in 1776, Adam Smith said:
It is but equity…that they who feed, clothe and lodge the whole body of the people should have such a share of the produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well-fed, clothed and lodged.
He was the great revolutionary thinker who has been sort of colonised by the right wing of the Tory party who do not read much of what he said. What he said at that time was true and it remains true today.
We do not believe that wages councils should be abolished. If they are abolished, the Government should be required to carry out the proposals in our new clauses. It would provide some element of protection for those whom we believe will be exposed to the harshest economic and social winds unless we do something to offer them some protection.
It boils down to this. On one side of the argument we have a few free-market freaks and Tory vested interests getting their pay-off for putting money into the Tory party. On the other side, we have Adam Smith, Winston Churchill, the Equal Opportunities Commission, the Fawcett Society, the citizens advice bureaux and a legion of other people who have demonstrated over decades that they are interested in the welfare of ordinary people and in promoting equal opportunities for women. I know where we stand tonight. I think that the Minister stands in a shameful position.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I think that the hon. Gentleman was proposing that the Government should be required to bring in a report on what will happen as a consequence of the abolition of the wages council system.
I oppose the abolition of the wages council system. Occasionally, the Minister has asked me whether I appreciate, and did I not say in 1985, that the abolition of the wages council system would cost jobs. In 1985, I was willing to accept that the abolition would cost some jobs.


So does health and safety at work and the sort of formal and informal cartels which help lawyers to be paid a certain amount of money. So, for that matter, does the level of pay of Members of Parliament. If we were paid half as much, we could have twice as many Members of Parliament for the same wage bill. All those things are self-evident. The question is at what level is it worth taking away protection from the vulnerable where it is not possible for them to have any equality in negotiating their pay.
I do not wish to exaggerate the effect of wages councils or the effect of abolishing them. However, if the wage levels set by wages council orders were wrong, it was open to the Government to propose, either in the Conservative election manifesto or subsequently, that they should have the power to reduce wages council orders by, say, 10 per cent., 15 per cent., or even 25 per cent.
The House is justified in being suspicious about a proposal to abolish wages councils based on consultation in 1988 when we had a general election in 1992 at which the issue could have been included in the manifesto and debated between the parties. It could have been a determinant in how people decided to vote. I do not believe that it would have affected many votes because the issue is more a private one. Given the number of people who move in and out of wages council sectors and sectors equivalent to wages council sectors, the issue would not necessarily have been the most important one.
However, the issue is important to more than 2 million people and to people in industries akin to wages council industries. We may hear from my hon. Friend the Minister about anomalies between raw meat and cooked meat shops. But in the high street most shops that are not covered directly by the retail orders pay wages equivalent to shops that are covered. We should ask whether abolition of the wages councils should have been declared policy at the last election.
My recollection of the consultation in 1988 is that there was not a strong view that wages councils should be abolished. Employers did not make strong representations that wages councils had a significant effect on employment or profits. My hon. Friend the Minister has been known to say—I do not want to traduce him completely, although I do not mind in part—that it does not matter very much if wages fall because jobs covered by wages councils are mainly part time and done by women and, in any case, 80 per cent. are paid more than the basic minimum rate.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: I have said no such thing. I have pointed out that most people who are covered by wages councils live in households in which there is a second source of income. Therefore, the emotive arguments made by Opposition Members do not apply.

Mr. Bottomley: As someone who is paid way above wages council rates but who produces a subsidiary income in a household, I take that as a friendly remark.
If wages councils orders have a highly inhibiting effect on employment, one would expect to find that most people covered by them were on the minimum rate. But most people are not. I could go through the economics if my hon. Friend the Minister was interested, but I might bore

the House. That fact that most people are not on the minimum rate suggests that wages councils do not have a great employment effect.
I have tabled various parliamentary questions asking the Government to estimate the employment effect of abolishing the wages councils. They have ducked those questions because the research reports do not indicate strongly one way or the other that there will be a significant employment effect. But we can guarantee that abolition of wages councils will have a significant effect on the pay of some individuals.
I asked the Department of Employment to analyse the levels of underpayment. The Department has consistently answered that it would cost too much to obtain that information. I would have been entertained, if this was not such a serious issue, by the exchanges between my hon. Friend the Minister and the shadow spokeman on employment. Perhaps a television programme could find only one or two people who were significantly underpaid, but the Department's wage inspectors find so many cases that it is not possible to give a full and useful answer to a Member of Parliament who asks how many cases of underpayment occur.
My hon. Friend the Minister talked about the significant increase in the number of employers who are prosecuted. I suspect that, even at the current high level, one would not get through one's fingers and toes in arriving at the annual total. If I am wrong and there have been more than 20 cases in the past year, perhaps my hon. Friend will interrupt my speech and tell me. There may have been a significant increase from seven to 15 prosecutions—more than double the number—but that is insignificant in relation to the amount of deliberate, let alone inadvertent, underpayment which inspectors find.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: I am surprised that my hon. Friend of all people should share the views of Opposition Members. In cases where people are paid wages below the legal level, does he want the matter to be put right, people to be paid according to the rate set down and any back-payment to be made, or does he want an increase in the number of prosecutions? If my hon. Friend is worried about low pay, surely the way in which the inspectorate chooses to carry out its task in the interests of those who are paid below the legal rate is a matter for it.

Mr. Bottomley: It would be inelegant for someone who previously held the post of my hon. Friend the Minister, but at a lower ministerial rank, to provide a running commentary. When my hon. Friend the Minister spoke about the increase in the number of prosecutions, I observed that he did not give the number. When I suggested that the increased number was below 20, he did not confirm it directly, but one can presume from his intervention that the figure is below 20. If my hon. Friend wants me to do so, I will say openly and aloud that I approve of the way in which wages inspectors have pay put right and required back-payment. Employers have been required to pay back-pay amounting to hundreds of thousands of pounds. I approve of that. However, I emphasise that the Department is fully aware of the level of underpayment, some of which is deliberate.
I should like my hon. Friend the Minister to give some estimate—I support the idea of a report—of what has happened in the sectors for which wages councils were abolished. He helpfully reminded the House that various


wages councils were abolished by the previous Labour Government. One of them was the council for the motor trades. The trade unions, through both organisation and the influence of their negotiations, increased the levels of pay. The wages councils legislation provides that the Secretary of State can lay an order to abolish a wages council where there is an alternative effective means of determining pay. I support that.
On the last Sunday of the 1979 election campaign I went to the Wembley rally as president of the Conservative trade unions. We demonstrated to trade union members and their families that they could cheerfully vote Conservative because the Conservative party understood the interests of working people and their families. Not many of them believe that we have changed much. Not many of them believe that we have changed since 1985, when I expressed to the House the views of the Government on the operation of wages councils. We struck out many of their complications. We proposed that they should not apply to people under the age of 21 because having the chance to start work is far more important than the level of pay at that age. The chance to start work becomes less important to people aged over 21.
I agree with hon. Members on both sides of the House that we should invest more capital so that wages costs become less significant in the cost of production. When I was a Minister in the Department of Employment there was an investment of a quarter of a million pounds for each person employed in glassmaking. Increasingly in offices and retail more money is invested in the system of distribution. The level of pay is not that important. In hotels and other service organisations, investment in cleaning, catering or other equipment can be increased so that the level of pay becomes less important. Yet my hon. Friend the Minister pretends to the House that wages councils have a significant effect on employment.
The challenge to the Government is, first, to explain why they did not make it plain before the last election that abolition of all the wages councils was on the agenda and, secondly, to make plain what they believe will be the employment effect of abolishing the wages council for those at present on or below the minimum rates. I do not want to hear about a statutory minimum wage for everyone. I do not advocate that. I want to hear what will be the effect of abolishing what we have now.

Mrs. Alice Mahon: I, too, watched the "Cutting Edge" programme last night. It was about the experience of a young reporter who went underground and worked for low and, indeed, illegal pay. Her experience mirrored that of many of our constituents, particularly my constituents in Halifax and the Calder valley, which is well known as an area of low pay.
The young woman's experience was identical to that of someone who wandered into one of my surgeries who earned £12 a day. A young man to whom I spoke a few weeks ago earned the same. That works out at £1.50 an hour, which is less than half the legal wage for that job. As my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) said, the legal wage is hardly a princely sum at £3.08 per hour. The employer of the boy who came to my surgery knew that he was breaking the law. This is something of which the Minister should take notice. His Government are supposed to be the Government of law and order, but they are very selective in their policy on prosecution. It is all very well for the Secretary of State for

Social Security to burst into Gilbert and Sullivan at party conferences, where he sings songs about prosecuting the poor and about the evil of the "something for nothing" society. It is quite wrong that people should claim benefits to which they are not entitled, but Ministers take a myopic view when they condone huge-scale law-breaking such as was depicted in the television programme to which I have just referred.

Mr. David Hanson: My hon. Friend talks about law-breaking. Does she know that she could go into any job centre in the United Kingdom and find advertisements for jobs which, despite their being in wages council sectors, pay rates below the minima set by the councils for which the Minister has direct responsibility?

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Mrs. Mahon: That is a very relevant point, which the Minister should address in his reply.
In 1991 in Yorkshire and Humberside, 34,996 establishments were registered with the wages inspectorate. A total of 1,639 workers in the region were found to be being illegally underpaid, with arrears assessed at £174,189—an average underpayment of about £106 per worker. I realise that the proportion of recovered arrears is quite high, but of the 1,777 establishments visited, 44.6 per cent. were found to be illegally underpaying. We know that the wages inspectors visit only a tiny proportion of registered work forces–5.1 per cent., I think. They tend to concentrate on the areas in which they feel that underpayment is most likely to occur.
The Minister is very reluctant to give figures, but I can say that, nationally, 5,971 establishments were found to be illegally underpaying. There were just 15 prosecutions—fewer than the 20 to which we have heard reference. In Yorkshire and Humberside there were only seven prosecutions for illegal underpayment. That should be compared with the number of people prosecuted for claiming benefits illegally. Such a comparison shows where the Government's priorities lie.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: Will the hon. Lady give way?

Mrs. Mahon: No. The Minister has intervened about four times. He is taking up the time of everybody else. Any point that he wants to make may be made in his reply.
In Yorkshire and Humberside, inspectors found 934 establishments that were failing to display wages council notices, 259 that were failing to keep adequate records of wages paid and 825 that were failing to keep adequate records of hours worked. I wonder why. Is this a major reason for the Government's negotiating us out of the social chapter in the Maastricht treaty? It is obvious that they are now into law-breaking on a massive scale. Perhaps they think that British workers would have access to European law if they had the same rights as European workers. We have a set of seedy, shabby, unprincipled Ministers presiding over this situation. They know that the law is being broken, but they do not care. Often there is no protection whatsoever for the people least able to protect themselves.
Last night's television programme showed how a reporter obtained a job in a private nursing home. The owner of the home—Mr. Majieson, a very wealthy man —employed the reporter as a laundry worker at £2.40 an hour, which is well below the legal wage. There are other implications for this floating work force. Their pay is so


low that they move on, constantly hoping for something better. Alternatively, they descend into a state of despair. The reporter was given no screening for any type of disease, despite the fact that she was working in a nursing home; she was given no instruction on health and safety; she even had to request rubber gloves, despite the fact that she was handling foul, soiled linen. On a number of occasions she was warned only after the event that she had been handling the soiled linen of a patient who had scabies.
This is not a marginal problem. If the wages council were overseen properly, if the inspectorate were doing its job properly, and if we had a Government who cared about the law, the councils could play an important part in looking after the growing number of people who are working in the private sector of the care industry. In 1982, there were 18,200 residents in private nursing homes and 44,000 in private residential care homes. The numbers have escalated. We are not talking about a marginal problem. We now have 109,000 people working in private nursing homes and 155,000 in private residential homes. We know where these homes are. Every local authority and every health authority has powers of inspection. It would be relatively easy to check on the wages being paid to employees, but the Government make no attempt whatsoever to do so. I am sure that if they were to take such a step they would find hundreds, if not thousands, of people being paid illegal rates.
The situation will undoubtedly get much worse when the wages councils are abolished. I am sure that there are many wealthy Mr. Majiesons who are breaking the law with impunity. The Minister must tell us why he and his colleagues preside over a Department that allows such a situation to continue.

Mr. Alex Salmond: The hon. Member will have noted that, now that the Secretary of State for Employment has joined her colleagues on the Front Bench, there are more Front-Bench Conservatives than Back-Bench Conservatives in the Chamber—and it is clear that the Back-Bencher who has just made such a fine speech was not invited by his Front Bench. Does the hon. Lady agree that there must be many guilty consciences around the various fine restaurants and bars in the Palace of Westminster this evening?

Mrs. Mahon: Indeed I do. The hon. Gentleman has made a very relevant point. Many of those hon. Members may have a vested interest and may want to stay out of the way because they themselves are private contractors who have done these things to people.
Wages councils are relevant to the protection of 2.5 million, if not 3 million, workers. If we go back to a system in which employers can pay whatever they want, we shall have a new form of slave labour. The Minister has his roots in the 19th, if not the 18th, century. The abolition of wages councils will not result in the creation of any more jobs. Cuts in the pay of already low-paid workers will reduce their spending power at a time of recession and will increase their dependence on state benefits. If the Government, having listened to the arguments in Committee and in the Chamber, still make the case that low pay is necessary to a successful economy, how do they explain the success of the German economy as compared with that of a country like Bangladesh? I do not think that

there is much chance of our winning this vote tonight, but I hope that the Government will reply to some of the points that I have raised.

Mr. Alex Carlile: It is interesting to see such a dearth—indeed, a total absence—of Conservative Back-Benchers wishing to take part in this debate in support of their Front Bench. We may finish the debate having heard only one Conservative Back-Bench speech —that of the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), who spoke most eloquently against the Government's view. What an ironic situation.
It seems to me that one searches Ministers' speeches in vain for one of the three cases that they might make for the abolition of wages councils. One looks for a moral case, an economic case or a political case, but one finds none. Indeed, in the 1909 speech of Winston Churchill to which reference has been made the moral case not against but for wages councils was made out very eloquently:
We believe that decent conditions make for industrial efficiency and increase, rather than decrease, competitive power.
That remains true today. The Government have failed to produce any evidence, let alone any cogent evidence, to the effect that competitive power and industrial efficiency will be increased by the abolition of the wages councils. Although wages councils no longer apply to workers aged under 21, there is evidence that the difference between the wages of workers aged under and over 21 in the same industry increased after abolition.
The Government seem to be claiming that 80 per cent. of people who work in wages council industries are in households in which another wage is coming in. I think that I heard the Minister express that view in one of his many interventions. What is the Minister really after? Is he after the sort of low-wage, many-job economy that those who visited central and eastern Europe before the political changes were used to seeing?
I recall getting into a taxi in Budapest a few years ago and being told by the driver that he was a professor of philosophy in a Budapest university, but to make ends meet he needed at least one other job. It was common to find people with two or three other jobs, working every hour possible to eke out a living. The Government seem by their policies to be aiming for that sort of economy.
A TUC survey suggested that four out of every five people involved in a wages council industry were female. Those statistics are undoubtedly right. It is ridiculous for the Government to suggest that all those women are secondary income earners. A 1990 labour force survey showed that 20.3 per cent. of wages council workers were single parents, compared with 13.8 per cent. of the general population. So it is self-evident that a single parent with no other source of income is 50 per cent. more likely to be employed in a wages council industry. The wages council for those single parents, female or male, is well worth having.
It is inevitable that overall wages will decrease following the abolition of wages councils. The effect will be to increase poverty and that will most strikingly affect single parents. The Government do not put forward a moral case, but an immoral, even an amoral, case. Their case is tainted by an acceptance that poverty is an acceptable element of a supposedly civilised economy.
Is there an economic case? In its defence—I emphasise "defence"—of wages councils, the Institute of Management says that any good employer who attempts


to maximise profits will automatically and sensibly set wage rates at a level at which the productivity and calibre of workers is reasonable. The institute accepts that wages councils give a valuable guide towards realistic wages levels. An efficient industry is surely one in which the workers are at least reasonably content and are prepared to work longer hours for their wages because they are worth having.
I recall visiting Poland and talking to a privatised industry's chairman just after the political changes there. He described how difficult it was for him to find new workers for his factory, even though he had work for them. The reason was that wages had gone so low under the old communist regime that women in particular thought it was no longer worth working. Wages were set at such an impoverished level that it was not worth doing anything other than rely on the state. There is a danger of that happening if wages councils are abolished.
One is left with the conclusion—if there is no moral or economic case for their abolition—that the Government are relying on a political case. But such a case has yet to be explained to us. As the hon. Member for Eltham pointed out in his powerful speech, if there was such a good political case to be made, that case and the evidence supporting it would have appeared in Doctor Major's casebook, the Tory election manifesto on which the Conservatives, by a squeak, won the election again last April. There was nothing to support that case in the Tory manifesto. We have before us a proposal that has not at any stage been supported by any cogent argument. I hope that the House will vote against abolition tonight.

Mr. Hanson: It was a pleasure to hear the contribution by the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley). I had the privilege, with many of my hon. Friends here tonight, of discussing the Bill for weeks and months in Committee, during which not a Conservative Member showed an iota of concern for those who will be affected by the abolition of wages councils, the people whom we are seeking to help.
The abolition of wages councils is a squalid part of the Bill, which we shall take pleasure in opposing in the Lobby. While we shall no doubt lose the vote, though not the argument, I trust that the Government will at least listen to the concerns that my hon. Friends and I are expressing as we debate the various clauses and amendments.
We are debating a squalid piece of legislation. Like many of my hon. Friends, I support the establishment of a minimum wage. Indeed, many of us fought the last election on that basis. Some former Conservative Members lost their seats because they opposed the concept. We must have a base line below which people are not allowed to fall, especially in environments which my hon. Friends have described, in which unions are not in place and in which workers are isolated. In some circumstances, workers face tremendous odds in making their voices heard.

Mrs. Audrey Wise: Does my hon. Friend accept that wages councils are necessary even in some industries where trade unions are in place, such as in retailing, because of the nature of the trade? It is an irony that the Bill will make it harder for workers to organise into trade unions, which means that we are faced with a terrible Siamese twins-type Bill because it makes it harder

to achieve powerful trade unions and at the same time makes it more essential for there to be powerful trade unions, as every other form of protection is stripped from workers.

Mr. Hanson: Having worked in the retail sector at the beginning of my career, I am well aware of the low wages, long hours and poor conditions that many in that sector must endure. I have been staggered during the debates on this issue by the way in which Conservative Members do not accept that Britain remains a low-paid, low-income society. The Bill, rather than strengthening people's rights and developing better pay and conditions, will continue to reduce the conditions and standard of living of many people.
There are still 6 million women earning below the Council of Europe's decency threshold. We still have 12 million people on income support, with 2.5 to 2.6 million workers covered by the wages councils that the Government want to abolish. Wales, my region, has the lowest levels of pay in the United Kingdom, currently 87 per cent. of the national average. If the Government press their proposals, the 147,000 people who work in clothing manufacturing and who now earn the princely minimum wage of £102.86 per week, or the 492,000 licensed residential workers who earn £113, will undoubtedly find their wages reduced.
There is overwhelming evidence that the abolition of wages councils will reduce wage rates in those industries, will have an impact on increasing family poverty, will force more people into state subsidy through benefit, will riot lead to net job creation and will remove much valuable legal protection. The Labour party has opposed the legislation from the beginning. In Committee we cited strongly the views of the Equal Opportunities Commission, a Government-sponsored body. We also cited the views of the Fawcett Society and the citizens advice bureaux. My citizens advice bureau in Flint lobbied me and put forward suggestions for widening the scope for wages councils to include private nursing homes and the security trade. The Trades Union Congress, the Low Pay Unit, the Institute of Management Consultants and many employers wrote to hon. Members during the Committee stage, saying that the abolition of wages councils was wrong, would not achieve the objectives sought by the Government and would hit hard those who were already suffering
In Committee, with all that weight of evidence in front of him, what did the Minister produce? He produced one solitary letter from Forte, contributors to the Conservative party, who did not even have the courtesy to send the letter to every hon. Member serving on the Standing Committee. Like many of my hon. Friends, I received not one letter nor one piece of evidence to support the abolition of wages councils.
The proposal has no logic. My region in Wales is the lowest-paid region in the United Kingdom. The abolition of wages councils will affect 109,500 workers in Wales; that is one in ten of the work force.
Underpayment has already been mentioned. The reports of wages councils inspectors show that in different parts of Wales 32 per cent. to 41 per cent. of establishments were underpaying their employees. Those underpayments are being made even when it is a criminal offence and there is a check by inspectors. Unscrupulous employers, those


who were said by Winston Churchill to undercut good employers, continue to underpay when there are legal checks.
I would welcome the Minister's comments on what will happen when wages councils inspectors have been removed, when underpayment goes underground, and when companies can get away with it because it is no longer a criminal offence. What will happen to the people who need support from the state to get a basic wage? We are not talking about vast burdens on employers but basic wages, low, poverty pay for people who need a strict mechanism to defend them from unscrupulous employers.
In Wales, if wages fell by only 10p per week £394,500 or £20 million a year would be lost to the local economy; one in ten households would be affected.

Mr. Oliver Heald: Will the hon. Member give way?

Mr. Hanson: Absolutely; I am glad that we have at last provoked a Conservative Member to say something.

Mr. Heald: When the hon. Gentleman says that the local economy would lose that amount of money, is not that only if no new jobs were created? Is it not the contention of the Government that new jobs would be created? Is not that a laudable and moral aim?

Mr. Hanson: The hon. Gentleman sat in Committee with me for many hours. If wages are reduced, no new jobs will be created. Workers will work harder for poorer pay and people who control the industries will take bigger profits. There will be no increase in jobs.

Mr. Graham: My hon. Friend will realise that the hon. Member for Hertfordshire, North (Mr. Heald) expects people to work for 10p an hour. The Minister expects people to work for nothing; he said that in Committee.

Mr. Hanson: My hon. Friend makes an apt observation.
As to the impact on the local economy in my region, my borough council, which is not Labour controlled, has written to me about its concern in regard to the loss of wages. If there is a knock-on effect, there will be greater unemployment. The people on wages councils rates do not go out and buy Alfa Romeos; they do not holiday in Barbados, nor do they buy Italian imports or fine suits of clothes. They go to the local shops to buy local food, they use local transport and they pay for things locally, boosting the local economy. If the money is taken out of the local economy, there will be a knock-on effect, particularly in areas like mine which relies highly on tourism.

Mr. Jimmy Boyce: We have heard much about spiteful policies. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Bill is not the result of a spiteful Government policy, but rather the result of a philosophical policy? If a more caring Government tried to operate the capitalist system and the philosophy of capitalism that the Government purport to operate, it would have the same effect, with decimation of conditions for working people. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government are not capable of implementing a policy that is fair to working people?

Mr. Hanson: My hon. Friend makes a valid point. The Government want to force down the wages of those in the low-paid sector.
The National Institute of Economic and Social Research has estimated that 25,000 jobs will be lost through the knock-on effect of spending cuts because of wage reductions. That will have a major effect on many industries.
I want to give a constituency example in support of the new clause. Just after I was elected, the husband of a constituent came to my surgery because the constituent was too frightened to come. The husband said that, because the powers of the wages council for the hotel trade were being reduced, the workers were not being paid overtime. They were being forced to work overtime on Saturdays and Sundays; if they did not agree, they were told to go because there were plenty of others to take their jobs.
I complained to the wages council inspector, who visited the hotel. He enforced the legislation and made the hotel chain pay the workers a decent overtime rate. The workers had a choice about doing overtime, because people who work in hotels have families too.
If the Government do not accept the amendment and do not undertake to consider the social implications of the abolition of wages councils, and if they proceed to abolish wages councils, what redress will there be for my constituent who is not a member of a trade union and who is only an individual employee in a massive hotel chain? My constituent will have no redress. She will be a cork, bobbing on the waters of a large company, to be washed up anywhere the company chooses to send her. That is not right.
We are are talking about basic rights. What is the objection to monitoring the working conditions and wages of lower-paid workers, and having a report back to Parliament? What is the objection to monitoring the effects of this vicious legislation? There should be no objections. That is why I hope the Minister will support the new clause.

Mr. Jim Lester: I wish to speak in support of my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley). Way back in history, when I was in the Department of Employment, I was responsible for wages councils. I always supported the principle of wages councils, although I also supported the move to improve their operation by taking away many of their peripheral responsibilities which tended to cloud the issue. Certainly I supported them in looking after sectoral interests and low-paid people.
I am well aware of the argument that the majority of people covered by wages councils earn more than the minimum level, but that does not justify their abolition because it is Parliament's responsibility—and I have always believed it was the responsibility of the Conservative party—to look after those who are least able to defend themselves, and not to stand back and allow those most able to defend themselves to roar away.
We have had many battles with the various think tanks, which purported to support my party but which, in many ways, have led it from the origins and the true traditions of Toryism. The think tanks argued that social security is the level of the basic minimum wage. That statement is offensive, and I find it impossible to support it.
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I am chairman of the Family Budget Unit, which is made up of academics and people with great expertise on living costs. We have done a great deal of work on what the family budget should be if a family is to have a minimum standard of living. I am sure that many hon. Members have seen the results as they have been published and many people are asking for them. Hon. Members should examine our report section by section. For example, we say that the food bill for a family of four will be £40 or £50. I often tell my wife, "Darling, this is what the Family Budget Unit says that you should be feeding our family of four on." She gives me a short, sharp reply and shows me the bill from Sainsbury's, which is almost always double or treble the amount that the unit thought necessary for a decent standard of living.
I am constantly amazed that anyone can cope or have a reasonable standard of living on social security. I recognise that even those people on a marginally higher wage find it enormously difficult to sustain a family.
To the Government's credit, they introduced family credit as a way to ensure state assistance for those people identified as living most in poverty—families with children. It seems odd for the Government to say that they want to support families through that scheme when, by abolishing wage councils, this Bill will increase the budget required to pay for it. In other words, we shall use Government money to subsidise low pay, especially for families, which seems a tremendous anomaly. Our thinking about the basic levels of social security and salaries required for people to live on ought to be much clearer, and we should think about protection for people who are least able to protect themselves.

Mr. Roy Beggs: Does the hon. Member agree that every worker who is responsible for a family deserves the dignity of being able to earn sufficient to provide for his family, irrespective of family credit?

Mr. Lester: Yes, I do; but I also recognise that society has changed considerably. From working with friends in the United States and other parts of the world, I recognise that traditional forms of employment in which a man—nowadays with his wife's assistance—can earn a reasonable income are tending to change. The idea of working for the same firm for 40 years has long since gone. People have to get their salaries as and where they can.
From his experience in Northern Ireland, the hon. Member for Antrim, East (Mr. Beggs) will know that the old basic industries no longer exist. We must look to a different pattern of employment, which forces me to conclude that a basic income system, which does not retract if people earn more money, is the only way forward. That, however, is another argument and I shall not develop it today.
My third reason for not supporting the withdrawal of the wages councils is that I have had experience of running a company for 25 years, and I made a profit in every year except one. I recognise that there are considerable variations in the terms and conditions of employment within industry. The great value of wages councils is that they took into account the conditions for a sector 'when considering the basic wage. For instance, in some sectors employees receive tips, but in others they do not; and

housing may come with some jobs. One cannot directly compare one job with another, and the wages councils acknowledge that.
Wages councils have been reviewed twice since they were formed and tended to include a majority of employers. I cannot conceive why, if employers were in the majority, they could not work within the wages council framework to set satisfactory minimum salaries for their industry—fair levels at which everyone could work.
I have listened to the arguments of some Opposition Members about job creation and also to my hon. Friends. The truth is that if people depress wages to produce goods at lower prices to sell them, it is more likely to reduce jobs than to increase them, because such employers would undercut those offering decent wages and standards. That is not a job-creation formula.
My last reason for not supporting the abolition of wages councils is political. At the next election it would give the Labour party a far stronger argument for introducing a minimum wage as the argument would be more powerful if there were no protection for people at the bottom of the scale. For the reasons that I have stated, I disagree with the arguments on the minimum wage. The wage would not take into account variations in terms of employment in different sectors of industry and would be too high for some industries, which would cause unemployment, or so low that it had no effect and was therefore not worth the legislation that it was written on. The minimum wage is an alternative to the wages councils, but I support the principle of sectoral minimum wages rather than a national minimum wage. The political reason is that the abolition of the wages councils would give the Opposition a strong case to introduce minimum wage legislation at the next election. I do not agree with such legislation but it has wide appeal. From a study of the opinion polls during the last election, one can learn how popular that suggestion was with the general public. The Bill is one way to make it even more popular at the next election.
An ancillary argument is that people in this country, who have a sense of their own dignity, will not be pushed around or allow their wages to be reduced artificially arid wrongly if they feel that that is an injustice. They will do something about it. What can they do? They can join a relevant trade union, or possibly a sectoral trade union, which might well form. Abolition of the wages councils would be a recruiting sergeant for the trade union movement, which was established to protect people whose employment was without protection. That is another reason why those of my colleagues who do not think as highly of trade unions as I do should think twice before supporting the abolition of wages councils. The suggestion that people will sit back and accept such treatment is contrary to my experience of what people feel when they think that they are being unjustly treated.
For all those reasons, I am glad to have been able to contribute to the debate. I signed the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham. I hope that the Government will think seriously about proceeding on their course. As the clause suggests, we ought to be careful to monitor the results of the abolition of the wages councils. For the reasons that I have expressed, their abolition will not do employment or the protection of the work force any good.

Mr. Graham: If anything has made me angry about the Government, it is their commitment to abolish wages councils. I come from Strathclyde, where the Government have inflicted a poverty that we thought unimaginable in a modern, high-technology country such as Britain. The levels of poverty would make anyone cry.
Our people are unemployed in their thousands and our young people are desperate for work, yet the Government have come up with this solution. The Government are going to abolish the wages councils and they imagine that doing so will create jobs. To devise something like that to replace jobs is the product of a sick mind.
Every single hon. Member makes a minimum of £31,000 a year. Yet people in this place have the audacity to suggest that wages from £2.59 to £3.10 an hour are too high—it is mind-boggling to say the least. In Committee, I told the Minister that I had a constituent who was expected to bring his family up on £1.85 an hour. At that time, the Minister agreed that some wages were so low as to be evil. Surely £3.10 an hour is evil pay in a modern society.
After 14 years of the Government totally mismanaging the economy, with unemployment raging at 3 million and bankruptcies hitting our companies every single day, the Government come up with the grand policy of abolishing wages councils. They want to abolish the wages councils that have protected 2.5 million people. The wages councils may not have done as well as we would have liked, but the Government have ensured that they could not be more effective and they have reduced their power.
In 1986, the Government started to reduce some of the wages councils' controls. The Minister knows very well what I am talking about; there has been a systematic and sinister move by the Government to reduce the wages councils' powers over the years. We have now reached the stage where they wish to abolish them. It is amazing that the Tory Government seem to want to ensure only that the rich get richer and the poor poorer. They never think about increasing the quality of life of the folk who live on social security benefit, but just talk about cuts, cuts, cuts.
I wonder why no Conservative Member has tonight been prepared to defend the abolition of wages councils? I was absolutely delighted to hear the two Conservative Members speak in support of wages councils. They are quite correct; there is no way that the abolition of the wages councils and low wages will create new jobs. Anyone who tries to lower already low wages must be the most evil member of society. From 1906 to 1909 there was a sweated trades exhibition, but in those days they had the vision to create the wages councils. We should have learnt from that, but the Minister does not seem to have realised that there are many people who live on low wages and have to have their wages topped up. Those people are means-tested.
Surely in a civilised society people should be entitled to decent wages to pay for rent, clothes, heating and food —why not? Surely all men and women deserve that dignity. Surely it is the right of every man and woman in this country who works to receive decent pay to allow them to afford to buy the necessities of life. However, the Government do not care and have come up with a measure to abolish wages councils. They have not given the House one example of the way in which that measure will create jobs.
Earlier statements have suggested that value added tax might be imposed on food, which could mean familie

spaying £8 or £9 a week extra on food. Let us consider the position. We abolish the wages councils and some unscrupulous employers get together and lower wages. What will happen to the poor families? They will have to pay VAT and pay extra for their food. We will be going back to the bad old days that my mother and father have told me about, when parents went to work hungry and worked hard to ensure that their kids would be fed.
This country has not been brought up to its present standard only to have it lowered so that impoverished mothers and fathers have to work in bad health and, ultimately, cannot work to feed their children. What have we come to? I wonder about the Government's logic.
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Earlier, I spoke about a young man who was getting £1 an hour and was expected to work seven days a week. When he asked for time off work to go to a wedding, his boss sacked him. That seems unbelievable, but it is true. I also told the Minister about the man who earned £1.85 an hour.
I shall tell the House another important, true story. A security guard worked with his dog and got about L1.70 an hour. After he had done 17 hours work with his dog, his partner failed to turn up, so the man worked another 17 hours at £1.70 an hour. A complaint was made about the dog and why it did not get a rest. An animal welfare group said that it would take the case to court if the dog was not given a rest. The man had to give his dog a rest, but the man himself got no rest. We have laws for dogs, but no decent laws for men and women in this country.
The Minister cannot honestly expect to create jobs out of the low paid. If the Government do not have the ability to ensure that this country re-establishes its manufacturing base and if they do not invest in young people, education and the quality of life of our people, they should give up. If the measure is the Government's only means of reducing unemployment—now at 3 million —the Minister should give up.
The Government should give our people a break. Our people need the wages councils, which must be improved and developed. The Government should forget their sick suggestion and get people back to meaningful, fruitful work. They should give my constituent an opportunity to work for a decent wage. He deserves a decent, fair pay for a fair day's work. If the Government give him that, people like him will make Britain great once again.

Mr. Salmond: I was struck by the contributions of the two Conservative Members, who were both against the Minister and the Government's attitude to the wages councils. The hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) made a graceful speech, obviously based on his experience and study of the issue. However, I was particularly struck by the remark of the hon. Member for Broxtowe (Mr. Lester), who said that he thought that the measure was an example of the fact that think tanks now have an over-mighty influence on the Conservative party. He was right—think tanks have taken over the asylum and the personification of that process is sitting on the Treasury Bench.
I studied economics at the same university as the Minister of State. I studied it for somewhat longer than he did and I have a theory that he has since been engaged in


a process of trying to devalue not only my degree, but the reputation and standing of one of Scotland's greatest moral philosophers, Adam Smith.
The hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Galbraith) expressed surprise that someone like Adam Smith should have railed against the concept of low wages. He should have expressed no such surprise: Adam Smith was opposed to low wages for the same reason as he opposed poll taxes. Both were indications of primitive, under-developed economies. That is what the Minister now stands for.
The economic effects of the abolition of wages councils will probably be marginal, because a fairly small number of workers is involved and relatively few of those workers are now earning only wages council rates. It could be argued that there will be an employment effect, but there will certainly be an effect on income and demand which will depress employment. Much more important than the macro-economic effect of abolition is the micro-economic effect on individual workers. Low wages unquestionably lead to the demoralisation of the work force and to a lack of efficiency.
The Minister should not find it particularly surprising that someone reduced to poverty-line wages, struggling to keep body, soul and family together on an income that does not sustain that effort, will feel less than comfortable about his working environment. Such a person may not put everything into being as efficient as possible. I suspect that the Minister greatly underrates the effect on individual companies of driving wages and conditions further down; I am sure that the leaders of such companies do. Many of the industries concerned already provide the worst wages and conditions in the economy.
More revealing in an economic sense, however, is what the Government's attitude to wages councils betrays about their overall approach to the economy. Today's papers quote the Secretary of State for Scotland as saying, in an aside to his speech at Edinburgh university, that people in Scotland must price themselves back into jobs. The Minister probably wrote that speech: he is nodding vigorously in agreement.
According to the Government, a low-wage economy provides the way to be competitive in the modern world. All the evidence suggests, however, that high- age, high productivity, high-efficiency economies are the most successful in the international environment. That is suggested not just by current evidence, but by historical evidence from Scotland. A hundred years ago, Scotland was the most prosperous country in the world per head of population and also paid the highest industrial wages in the world. Those wages were the result of a highly skilled, highly educated work force, relative to other countries at that time.
Given that historical experience, and given all the current international experience suggesting that high-wage, high-skill economies provide the route to economic success, why should the Minister suddenly find an economic formula suggesting that low wages and low productivity present the magic solution to economic difficulties?

Mr. Michael Forsyth: I agree with the hon. Gentleman's analysis of the desirability of a high-wage, high-skill economy and with his analysis of the Scottish economy 100 years ago. Perhaps he will now tell us how Scotland managed to pay high wages before wages councils existed.

Mr. Salmond: Is the Minister now arguing that wages councils are necessary to maintain high wages? If not, why on earth is he pursuing that line?
Wages councils were introduced in the early years of the century to try to introduce some decency to the wage-bargaining process. The argument about wages councils is not an economic one, as the Minister would know if he had followed my speech more carefully. It concerns morality and decency and whether Members of Parliament can legislate, not to protect the poor against the strong, but to reinforce the power of the strong over the weak. It is about whether, instead of further reducing the standards for some of the most powerless and vulnerable sections of society, we should accept responsibility for enacting legislation designed to reinforce whatever power we can give such people.
Yesterday, the Secretary of State for Scotland argued —with the Minister's agreement—that people should price themselves back into jobs. That typifies the Government's overall economic approach. Why cannot people educate themselves into jobs? Why can we not train them into jobs? Why can we not replicate the success of the economies that are currently most successful internationally and the success of Scotland 100 years ago?
Let me end my speech as I began it, with a reference to Adam Smith. It is no great surprise that a moral philosopher like Adam Smith did not consider it appropriate for wages to be driven down—no surprise, that is, to anyone but the Minister, who has abused Adam Smith's theory and writing throughout his political career. The essential question for the House tonight, however, is one of decency. Are we going to pass legislation that will drive down further the wages and conditions of a group of people who may not have much effect on the macro-economy in numerical terms, but whose lives, interests and families are entitled to far more respect than the Minister is prepared to give them?

Ms. Eagle: It is interesting to note that so far every Conservative Member has supported the new clause—which I, too, support—and opposed the Government's move to abolish wages councils. Unfortunately, we were not much enlightened in Committee: after some six hours of argument against abolition, the Minister dismissed what had been said in one and a half sentences. I hope that we shall now hear some explanation for the Minister's belief that the move is reasonable and will create employment—and, perhaps, some evidence for his view.
I do not believe that any such evidence exists, and many of the speeches that we have heard so far have powerfully reinforced my view. I believe that the Government's decision was born out of purely ideological dogma—and they are one of the most dogmatic Governments of the century. The measure is being imposed without consultation, and with hardly any attempt to justify it by means of genuine argument about the effects of abolition.
The proposal is an example of the Government's obsession with what I described in Committee as neo-classical 19th-century liberalism with a dash of Benthamite utilitarianism. I stand by that analysis. Let me add that that mixture of policy and philosophy is much older than Winston Churchill's observations in 1909—which were derided by some Conservative Back Benchers as old fashioned—and much more out of date.
I pointed out in Committee that the mixture of policy and philosophy to which I have referred led to the creation


of the poor laws and the workhouse. In the neo-classical economic model, wages are driven down to whatever level the market dictates—which may be lower than people need in order to live, let alone enjoy life. There is no reason why wages cannot be driven down to zero or below. The Government continue to cling, however, to their outmoded dogma, despite all the evidence to the contrary —that their blessed belief in market forces leads to impoverishment. When the labour market is, as the Government would say, freed up, it fails to provide the work force with wages that can sustain body and soul. If wages councils are abolished, that is what will happen to the 2.7 million workers who now enjoy the protection of wages councils.
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Simply because of the way that the market operates, the abolition of wages councils will also lead to impoverishment slightly higher up the wages scale. If already low wages are pushed even lower, the wages of people in the more casualised sector of employment will also be pushed lower, which will take even more money and spending power out of the economy and create even more impoverishment. Clause 28 is an attempt to deregulate the labour market even further and to reduce wages costs, the spurious idea being that that, somehow, will create employment.
The Government regard any kind of cost of employing anybody as a burden on business. That is the phrase that they have used. They talk about people being priced back into jobs but we have heard already in the debate that wages council rates are woefully inadequate now. Many examples have been quoted of the wage rates being paid in non-wages council areas. I do not intend to give other examples, although I could do so. I have examples of wage rates as low as £1.80 an hour and others that are as low as £1 an hour.
We are being asked to agree to taxpayers having to subsidise bad employers, who pay poverty, exploitative wages to their work force, with their taxes, simply because people who are paid wages of £1 an hour can scarcely feed themselves on such wages, let alone try to feed and clothe their families. It is insulting that taxpayers should be asked to subsidise bad employers and that wages should then be ratcheted down so far that many other employers, who would prefer to pay higher wages, find that either they have to pay lower wages, because of the competitive pressures, or sack their workers.
That is the way that the market mechanism works. It drives out the good and the responsible employers and replaces them with the bad, irresponsible and exploitative employers. It has happened many times in the last century and a half. If wages councils go, it will happen again and the ratcheting down of wages will accelerate.
One of the Government's policy objectives has been to achieve a widening of the gap between the rich and the poor. They have certainly achieved their objective during their period in office. There is massive poverty now, all of which helps to make it harder for the labour market to have any power. With unemployment standing at 3 million or 4 million—one can argue about the figure, but I say that the figure is closer to 4 million than to 3 million—there is a massive pool of people who are able to replace those who

make a fuss about being paid low wages. That immediately leads to another drag on the levels of wages that can be paid.
In addition, there has been a deliberate strategy by the Government and their predecessors since 1979 to strip away, bit by bit, the employment protection measures that were on the statute book when the Conservatives first came to power in 1979. We have now reached the stage where employment protection under the law is at its absolute minimum. One has to work for two years before one qualifies for any kind of protection against unfair dismissal. Even the protection that one gains after two years in full-time employment and five years in part-time employment does not stretch as far as reinstatement. All this intimidates people and prevents them from managing to achieve even the few employment rights that they have under the law to adequate wage levels and adequate terms and conditions of employment.
There has been a deliberate attempt to create a low-tech, no-skill and cheap economy. The result of the deregulation of the labour market—combined, on the macro-economic level, with the Government's incompetence, due to another of their obsessions that is not relevant to the Bill but which I mention only in passing, monetarism—is mass unemployment. That has led to the creation of a one third, two thirds society. The people who are in the bottom third cannot hope to do anything other than casualised, unprotected jobs for wages that, frankly, would have been a scandal at the turn of the century and that are a scandal today.
We, as a legislature, have a responsibility to put a stop to that. The last thing that we should be doing today is dismantling the last vestiges of minimum wage protection for already poor and vulnerable groups.

Mrs. Wise: Has my hon. Friend overlooked the excuse that is given by the Treasury Bench—that most of these people are women, anyway, whose income is therefore subsidiary? Is my hon. Friend waiting with bated breath, as I am, for the Secretary of State for Employment and all her female colleagues to declare themselves as mere subsidiaries and that they are queuing up to take a cut in their salaries on the same grounds?

Ms. Eagle: I agree with the sentiments expressed by my hon. Friend. The abolition of wages councils will affect women more than any other group of workers, because 80 per cent., or thereabouts, of wages council workers are women. The labour market is so segmented at the moment that women generally tend to find themselves in the lower echelons of job grades and, therefore, on lower pay.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) said in his speech, wages councils lead to a unisex wage. The so-called gender gap—the gap between the average earnings of men and women in particular jobs—is consistently narrower in every wages council industry than it is in the non-regulated sector. As the Equal Opportunities Commission points out in its comments on the Government's attempts to abolish the wages councils, their abolition will have another effect. Apart from the effect on relative levels of poverty, when already low wages decline even further there will be a widening of the gender gap between men and women workers in the non-regulated sector.
The abolition of the wages councils will put us in grave danger of being in breach of the equal rights directive. I


hope that the Minister will deal with that matter when he replies to the debate. It will run against the spirit of the equal pay legislation that has been on the statute book for 20 years. I shall be interested in what the Minister has to say about the Government's plans to ensure that the gender gap between women's pay and men's pay in this sector, as in all others, is narrowed rather than widened.
The workers in the more exploitable areas tend to be women. They also tend to be members of the ethnic minorities. One in four of the ethnic minorities who are lucky enough to have a job find that they are confined to wages sector industries. We can also expect the gap between their pay and the average rate to widen if 'wages councils are abolished.
As for the effect that abolition of the wages councils will have in my region, the north-west, in so far as we have been able to find out, 345,000 people are working in wages council industries. It is, however, a reasonable estimate and amounts to one in 10 households.
If we assume that the abolition of wages councils leads to a 20p fall in wages—it is a very generous assumption given that some of the wage rates that I mentioned earlier are currently being paid in the north-west—and if we also assume an 18-hour week because of the part-time nature of some of the employment that we are discussing, the abolition of wages councils will lead to a withdrawal of £52 million from the economy of the north-west and £10–2 million from my own region of Merseyside. Clearly, that will have an effect on employment.
What are the Department's estimates of the employment effect of withdrawing that spending power from not only the north-west but from the country as a whole if, as I believe will happen, wage rates go down in the aftermath of the abolition of wages councils? The new clause would require statistics to be kept not only on the level of wage rates within wages council industries and the areas that were covered by them but on other aspects. We should certainly appreciate some statistics that we can trust so that we can make a proper assessment of the economic effect of abolition. Neoclassical economic theory accurately predicts what will happen.
Having listened to what the Government have said in their justifications—thin as they have so far been—for including abolition in the Bill, it is clear to me that they want wages to fall. Surely that is what "pricing yourself into a job" means in Tory-speak. I do not know how one can price oneself into a job at £1–80 an hour. I wonder whether we want such jobs. Should we be aiming for jobs that pay £1.80 an hour and which offer people absolutely no rights or dignity? Do we want such jobs in an advanced, highly technological society which purports to want to compete with some of the most advanced societies in the western world?
I suspect that the result of the Government's obsession with their own little neoclassical dogmas and the demand and supply curve in the labour market, of their continuing obsession with deregulation and of their seeming indifference to the human effect of the ratcheting down of wages in the one third of the country that has been impoverished by their actions, will be to turn us from the workshop of the world, which we have now ceased to be thanks to the Government's wonderful industrial strategies, into the sweatshop of the world. For that reason, I support new clause 12 and oppose the abolition of the wages councils.

Mr. Burden: I support the new clause because it is important that we have evidence of the impact of the abolition of wages councils. That impact will be not only on statistics but on people, some of the worst-paid employees in the country.
In Committee there was a good deal of double-speak from the Government about why they want to abolish wages councils and what they think the impact of abolition will be. They argue that wages councils are unnecessary because 80 per cent. of employees covered by them are paid more than the legal minimum. That argument does not stand up to too close an examination, but, for the moment, let us accept it.
How does that argument square with the other argument, uttered in the next breath by the same people, that wages councils are apparently a barrier to employment? The Government point to pay increases in wages council industries, allege that they are higher than the general level—although they are not—and imply that the level of wages in wages councils industries and services stop people being employed. The Government cannot have it both ways. They cannot say that wages councils are irrelevant and, in the same breath, say that they are a barrier to employment.
If wages councils are abolished, there will be a cut in pay for some of the lowest-paid employees in the country. The Government will be giving vent to some of their worst and most grotesque ideological prejudices. They are throwing a bone to their right wing, saying, "Don't worry about Maastricht. When all is said and done, we can produce a Bill that will have a go at low-paid workers and the unions." That is what the Bill is all about.
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We have got used to the Government saying that inequality and poverty must be tolerated. We do not accept that, but we have got used to them saying it. We do not and will never accept that inequality and poverty must be deepened and increased, which is the basis of the Bill.
It is time that Conservative Members showed some honesty about how low they are prepared to watch wages fall. We have yet to receive an answer to the question whether they think that £2–78 is too high a wage for a hairdresser. Is it? We have yet to receive an answer to the question whether £2.92 is too high a wage for someone working in a restaurant. We have yet to have some honesty from the Government about the responses that they have received to the proposal, about the fact that the majority of responses opposed the abolition.
We have yet to have some honesty from the Government about what the employment effects will be and the fact that even some of their own studies offer no clear evidence of employment increasing if wages councils are abolished. As my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) made clear, if wages councils were such a barrier to employment, how is it that employment in wages council industries and services has increased in recent years?
We need the Government to show some honesty about the disproportionate effect that the abolition of wages councils will have on women. Eighty per cent. of employees covered by wages councils are women, and the only answer we have had from the Government is, "Don't worry about that because in the main they contribute a


second income." The Government then have the gall to get upset when we accuse them, rightly, of advancing the argument about pin money.
The Government should be aware that there are challenges in Europe to the proposed abolition of wages councils and its relationship to the treaty of Rome. I have no doubt that, in a few weeks, we shall hear of another miraculous legal opinion which proves that it does not matter.
In the west midlands, 270,000 employees will be affected if wages councils are abolished. As in other parts of the country, that means about one in every 10 households. If only 20p an hour were taken off the pay in wages council industries, £50 million would be lost to the west midlands alone. That is not about boosting the economy or increasing prosperity; it is about cutting pay. There is no suggestion among my constituents that it is the low-paid workers who cause unemployment. They know that it is Government policies and the recession that they have created and deepened.
In my city of Birmingham, a 33-year-old cafe assistant works 25 hours a week at the rate of £2 an hour. Her legal entitlement is £73 but she received £50. That is an illegal underpayment. I wonder why the Government do not put the emphasis that they put on the Bill into tackling that sort of problem, because the Bill will make such underpayment legal. In Committee, Conservative Members said that they did not condone illegal underpayment, but the Bill will legalise underpayment.
What will be the position of that cafe worker in the brave new world of voluntary bargaining? If she goes to her employer after wages councils have been abolished and exercises the free will, which Conservative Members impress on us that she has, to bargain with her employer for an increase in pay, her employer can sack her on the spot. When he does so, she will have no legal redress. A few years ago she would have had some legal redress, but, under present Government rules, because she has worked for only 10 months she has none.
Why have the Government, who want to abolish wages councils, a ratio of wages inspectors to workers covered by wages councils of 1:40,950? Compare that with the Government's cause celebre, alleged social security fraud. Even on a–1 apologise for using the word—conservative estimate of the number of staff in social security offices who are engaged in tracking down alleged social security fraud, the ratio is 1:14,000.
We have had a lot of flannel from the Government Benches, but I wonder who will be seen to have won the argument when the report of tonight's debate and our proceedings in Committee are read. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have said that the Government are wrong to scrap wages councils. The Government have not even managed to summon one Conservative Member to defend them today. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms. Eagle) said, in Committee we heard one and a half sentences from the Minister in answer to six hours of debate.
I have no doubt about the will of the House tonight and who has won the argument, but I suspect that, irrespective of the argument, when it comes to the vote Conservative Members who have not been prepared to back up the Government's argument will troop through the Lobby in their support.
I urge hon. Members to support the new clause and to reject what has been put forward by the Government. We

are in the era of citizens charters, but there seems to be no citizens charter for the low paid—quite the opposite. What we have here is a charter for poverty pay put forward by "Citizen Michael" and "Citizen Gillian" which we should reject.

Mr. Hutton: This has been a significant debate for two principal reasons. First, if I am right and we lose the vote tonight, we will be marking the end of a consensus that has united both sides of the House for more than 80 years. That consensus is a matter in which the House can take pride. For that length of time, during two world wars and Governments of intense ideological commitment, both sides of the House have remained committed to the idea that it is appropriate and right for the House to set minimum rates of pay for the lowest-paid workers; those workers who do not have the benefit of collective organisation through the trade unions and who look to us in the House to guarantee them some basic decency and minimum rights in terms of their workplace.
In Committee we heard arguments from the Government about the rationale behind their proposals, but their case was pathetically shallow and superficial. They presented no economic case for the abolition of the wages council and, as many of my hon. Friends have pointed out tonight, there is no economic case for abolishing the wages councils. If we were to abolish them, the same or a declining number of people would simply work for less wages. There would be no stimulus or boost to the employment prospects of tens of thousands of people in our country who are currently out of work. The abolition of the wages councils would simply depress wages for the most vulnerable and exposed section of the work force. That is a contemptible and sad thing for even this Government to be attempting at this moment. When the recession shows no sign of ending and unemployment shows every sign of increasing, the Government's response is to abolish the wages councils, and that is contemptible.
The consensus to which I have drawn attention is worth spelling out and looking at. It represents a philosophical approach, the guaranteeing of statutory employment rights, which is commendable. As part of my preparation for tonight's debate I made an effort to look at speeches made by the then Secretary of State, now the noble Lord Prior, when he spoke for the Government during the debate on the Loyal Address in May 1979. He made an observation which still commands much respect in the House. He said:
The law should always give full recognition to the inherent weakness of the individual worker vis-a-vis his employer".—[Official Report, 21 May 1979; Vol. 967, c. 824.]
That is a perfectly credible and coherent philosophical approach for hon. Members to embrace again tonight. Ultimately, we are discussing not just the issue of low wages, which is significant and should command attention, but a broader vision of the role of the House in establishing minimum employment rights. It is significant that, for example, when we consider other transactions, other contracts, there is no reluctance on the part of the Government or the Opposition to intervene in the marketplace and establish minimum terms and conditions on which parties can contract.
I think, in particular, of the law relating to consumer protection which has dominated much Government thinking for the past 20 years. Consumerism has become an important issue and Governments of both parties legislated extensively throughout the 1970s to intervene


directly to protect consumers. That is perfectly credible because it recognises the fact that, in a normal marketplace transaction, the consumer is often in a weak position. He is unable to negotiate on a one-to-one basis with the supplier of goods and services, and Parliament, through a number of different devices, has intervened to protect consumers.
When it comes to employment protection rights and to protecting the rights of workers, I am afraid that we see a completely different approach from the Conservative Benches. They embrace the notion of the market and express the idea that workers, uniquely, are in a position to negotiate on a one-to-one, head-to-head basis with employers from a position of equal bargaining strength. Opposition Members know that that is simply not the case; it is not a description of the real world. That was recognised in 1909 when the House first established the wages councils. Until this Bill was presented to the House, that was the position embraced by hon. Members on both sides of the House.
The other significant thing about tonight's debate is that those Conservative Members who have spoken—we have heard two excellent speeches from Conservative Members tonight, both ex-Ministers in the Department of Employment—have spoken out against the Government's proposals. The Government have not been able to find one hon. Member to make the case in favour of the abolition of the wages councils. The Minister shakes his head, but I have been in the Chamber throughout the debate and I have not heard one speech from a Conservative Member in support of the Government on this matter. [Interruption.] The Government have not found one Conservative Member to speak in favour of their case.
We have heard much waffle from Ministers during the past few weeks about the inherent logic of their decision to abolish the wages councils. For example, the Minister says that they are no longer necessary in the labour market of the 1990s. He has produced not a shred of evidence to support the case that the wages councils are not necessary. The Conservative election manifesto, upon which he and his right hon. and hon. Friends were elected, significantly make no reference to the Government's ambition to abolish the wages councils.
As we are debating a number of issues relating to the clause and the ethos of employment protection, it is worth pointing out that the oblique reference to the Government's philosophical commitment is to be found on page 20 of the manifesto which says:
The workers' rights we believe in are those which enhance the individual's status and opportunities.
The abolition of wages councils will do none of those things. It will not enhance the rights of workers or their status, and it will expose them to what I can only describe as the real prospect of significant exploitation by a group of cowboy employers who are rubbing their hands at the prospect of being liberated from the constraints of the wages councils. That, for many millions of British people, will be a grim and horrifying prospect.
It is also worth pointing out that the Government are unique in their isolation among civilised nations in their ambition to remove from British employment law any minimum employment protection in terms of low wages. It is significant that the International Labour Organisation convention No. 26 has 100 nation state signatories, but only this country signed the convention and then deratified

it. That shows that the Conservative Government are effectively isolated in the broad sweep of international opinion. No other country is going down this road.
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My hon. Friends and some Conservative hon. Members have drawn attention, rightly, to the remorseless drive to deregulate the labour market and have said that it will not produce the high-wage, prosperous economy that Conservative hon. Members, particularly the Government, pretend to have brought into existence after 14 years in power. We are a long way from that econony, from having that kind of society. I am sure that it is the view of all my hon. Friends that there is no doubt that abolishing the wages councils will accelerate the move towards a low-wage, low-prospect, poor-training, no-prospect labour market with increased exploitation and the prospect of many people working for wages which are disgracefully low.
As I said in Committee, it is an appropriate exercise of our power to make rules and to intervene on behalf of those people who, if they are left to the sheer force of the labour market, will find themselves working for unacceptable wages which we as civilised law-makers should not countenance. That is not a healthy development for this Parliament.
I hope that I speak for all my hon. Friends when I say that it is perfectly legitimate, in pursuit of a broad public policy objective, for this House to continue to express its support for wages councils in the full knowledge that if we do that tonight we shall not be adding to the burdens of employers nor adding to unemployment but doing something positive and constructive. I suspect that that is why most Conservative Members will not support us in the lobbies tonight, because they have a pathological aversion to doing anything that might improve the employment rights of British working people.
It is important that we consider the abolition of wages councils against that background. They are an important part of the broad statutory employment framework that we have developed over many decades which has commanded until now a broad consensus of opinion on both sides.
We can describe the Government's intentions as, at best, wishful thinking in that they hope that the abolition of wages councils will increase employment and improve prospects in the labour market. It will not do that. That is wishful thinking; it is a false hope. There is no evidence for it. It is a sad reflection of the Government's economic agenda that they present that case to the House tonight.
At worst, it is an example of cynical exploitation, exposing workers who deserve and look to this House for protection to the prospect of exploitation by employers who show complete contempt for the laws on minimum wages and wages councils and who will clearly take the opportunity offered to them by this Bill to lower wages even further for people who are already in the poverty trap. That is disgraceful and a pathetic reflection of this Government's ambition and their agenda, of their lack of imagination, in that this is all that they can come up with. I hope that hon. Members on both sides will have the courage and conviction to do the right thing and will reject the Government's shameful proposal.

Mr. Mike Watson (Glasgow, Central): This has been one of the most stimulating debates in which I have


participated during my years in the House. It has been particularly interesting to note the contributions from hon. Members not just in my party, which were excellent, but from the hon. Members for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) and for Broxtowe (Mr. Lester) who not only made excellent speeches but have stayed to listen to most of the debate. I hope they will be in the Lobby with us.
As to the rest of Conservative hon. Members who are here or who should be here—there are empty Conservative Benches—they should find no reason to oppose the two amendments that we are discussing; nor should the Minister. We say in those amendments that if the wages councils are abolished, as the arithmetic of the House tells us they will in the course of time, and if it has the impact which we say it will, then the Minister should come here and tell us what he will do about it. Is that a frightening prospect? If he tells us that there will be no serious effect from this legislation, what is he afraid of and why is he opposing the new clauses? As so many speakers have pointed out this evening, the abolition of wages councils fits somehow into the Government's economic policy and clause 28 of the Bill has to be seen as part of the Government's intention to drive down wages, to bring about a low-skill, low-wage security and a no-hope work force that cannot stop cowering out of fear of being out of a job, desperate to take anything.
If ever there were an example of that, and the Minister seemed to dismiss it earlier, it was provided by that impressive and moving television programme last night, "Cutting Edge". The Minister demeaned it by making some rather trivial points about it. The programme gave a graphic description of the situation facing millions of low-paid workers. We saw a young woman desperately chasing round the country looking for work and we saw the way that she was treated. That seems inevitably to be the way in which such people will be treated, and even more so if abolition of the wages councils goes through. That surely will be the only result.
We have heard many arguments this evening but it is about the fact that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (Mr. Hutton) argued, the key word is poverty. People are living in poverty, being paid poverty wages even if they can find work. This Government should be showing them the way out of poverty, and giving some hope but in fact they are doing the opposite and saying, "If you have not got a job we will give you a job at £1–50 an hour." I can give countless examples from my constituency of people, in the centre of a major city, working for less than £2 an hour. I am not just talking about security guards. People in a hopeless position will of course grab at any lifeline. Does that mean we should be driving them further into the mire? Should we be saying to them—and let us get the figures right—"We think that if you are being paid between £2.59 and £3.10 an hour it will dissuade employers from taking you on"? That is what the Government are saying. If there were any doubt about that, my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson), opening the debate, surely sank it decisively by showing that 90,000 new jobs had been created in wages councils areas at a time when unemployment was rising out of control.
I understand that the Minister failed to answer a similar debate in Committee, although I was not on the

Committee. If he failed to do so, then he must answer it tonight and come up with a convincing reason, if he can find one, for saying that wages councils prevented employment being created and that they prevent employers taking on people they would be itching to take on if only they did not have to pay them £2.59 an hour.
We have heard many arguments about abolition of the councils, but we have to consider the effect on women because it has been said that 80 per cent. of the 2,500,000 people who come within the remit of wages councils are women. It has to be stressed that most women still work in what are traditionally regarded as women's jobs, usually low-paid and often undervalued.
We had a ministerial answer today showing that male workers' earnings are at present about £221 a week while women, mainly those working as hairdressers, are being paid only £110 a week on average while in the hotel and catering industry, which is also covered by wages councils, they are earning £126 a week. How can anyone say that that dissuades employers from taking people on? If the Government have an economic strategy to raise the country out of its present dire situation with unemployment about to go over the 3 million mark, even on the Government's own figures, how will they arrest that decline by this kind of measure? There are 4,500,000 part-time workers and 83 per cent. of that part-time work force have limited career prospects and involve the sort of women we saw on television last night. Despite the role they play in manufacturing and service industries, the Government give no credence or value to that area of work. I hope that the Minister will answer the points made about the typical role of women in society and in the work force.
The Secretary of State does a great disservice to her gender by suggesting that women have no economic role and no contribution to make to production or to the economy of the country. Surely the time is long overdue for the value of women in the work force to be recognised and for the Minister and his right hon. and hon. Friends to give some thought to the effect that the abolition of wages councils would have not just on women but on their families, and increasingly on those women who are, despite what the Minister has said, the breadwinners in many cases.
Many hon. Members have mentioned the situation in their own areas and I would like to say a few words about the situation in Scotland. Underpayments within Scotland in the period 1987–91 increased by 128 per cent. That is a higher figure—I take no pride in this—than in Wales or any of the English regions. In this connection, I would like the House to consider an aspect that has not been raised in this debate: the enforcement of the decisions of the wages councils and the rates that they have set for the past 80 years.
In 1991, in Scotland, only 7.5 per cent. of employers were visited by wages council inspectors, and 28.6 per cent.—that is, about 750—were found to be underpaying. The wages council inspectors get round far too few employers because of the shortage of staff, but, of those 737 who were underpaying, only two were prosecuted for paying below the set rate. So nearly one third of the employers were found to be paying below the rate—breaking the law, it should be stated again. They should be thrown out of the party which claims to be the party of law and order. But only two were prosecuted, and the rest were let off scot free.
The Government consistently rail against what they call social security scroungers. They ought to turn their attention to the Scrooges who, apparently without any shame, return home every evening and sleep soundly, despite the fact that they are making their money out of paying people less than £2 an hour. What service do they perform for society? What assistance do they give to the development of the economy?
The Government would have us believe that they are doing everybody a favour. There are no restrictions on the levels of wage that they are allowed to pay or on how they can treat people. They can hire and fire at will, and they regularly do, within the excessively long two-year period through which people have to qualify for what are normal, generally acceptable rights at work in other countries. Rather than doing the country a favour, they are doing only themselves a favour. The Government are aware of that, but those are their friends; they are the people in the companies that make contributions to the Conservative party. If there is any logic in this clause in the Bill, it is that the Government are repaying the debts which they contracted during the general election campaign. That may be some form of twisted logic, but it is not a justification.
The situation is that evasion in terms of enforcement of the legislation triumphs over provision, sneer triumphs over fear—again a reference to the television programme last night—and greed triumphs over need. We in the Opposition at least are prepared to say that those in need are those to whom we will give tirst consideration, and that we will attempt to develop policies which will assist them in raising their standard of living and getting a decent job and a decent wage which will allow them and their families to live with some dignity.
To some extent, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. Burden) touched on an interesting statistic—the number of wages inspectors which is currently 61. We have to contrast that figure with the number of inspectors dealing with benefit fraud. About 2.5 million people are covered by wages councils, with 61 wages inspectors to enforce the law on their behalf. There are some 3 million unemployed, at least, yet 780 inspectors are involved in enforcing the law on benefits. That is hardly a balanced approach.
We would not necessarily expect a balanced approach, but the prejudice which the Government show against the poor in society, the powerless and the helpless never ceases to amaze me, yet never seems to cause any kind of shame or embarrassment to Conservative Members. It is a situation which I and my hon. Friends will continue to expose at every opportunity. The Government cannot be serious about their attempts to regenerate the economy, for green shoots to begin to grow, if the only way that they act is to force people to earn less.
I refer, as the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) did earlier in the debate, to the comments by the Secretary of State for Scotland yesterday, speaking at Edinburgh university, about people pricing themselves into jobs. The Minister of State, who nodded vigorously when that point was made, should tell us what is meant by people pricing themselves into jobs. Why is it that the people at the bottom have to reduce their salaries to make themselves employable, yet directors of the public utilities now privatised, or in industry, can only price themselves into jobs by going as high as possible, by going into figures like telephone numbers for salaries? Perhaps the Minister,

in winding up, will tell us why there should be such a difference between the top and the bottom of the scale, and why, when push comes to shove, his efforts and his friends' efforts will always be against those at the bottom and in favour of those at the top. There is no logic to that, but I look forward to hearing the Minister's explanation.
I know that many hon. Members wish to speak in the debate, and it has already run for some considerable time, so I will bring my remarks to a close. I am not in any sense exaggerating when I say that the "Cutting Edge" programme last night had a profound effect upon me. It was not just the woman herself, who was, of course, a journalist and to some extent was cushioned from the long-term effects of her experiences over the three months. I was concerned about the people that she was meeting on a daily basis. She was asking them about their wages and why they had never done anything about them, and it was quite clear that they were afraid to raise the matter. We did not learn whether the sectors in question were unionised; I suspect that almost definitely they were not. But the point is that those people are afraid to raise so much as a question with their employers about the rates of pay, the hours they work or the conditions that they have to face, because they are terrified that they will lose their jobs.
That is the situation, because of the desperate state of our economy, and it is a situation that the Government seem to be prepared to accept and make the basis of our economic recovery. It is a scandalous and indefensible position.
The woman in the programme slogged away at a number of pitifully paid jobs and, as if that were not bad enough, had to demean herself by going some 40 or 50 miles to her employer's house to beg for £75 that she had already earned and was entitled to. Then she had to make all kinds of desperate pleas before she got the money. What stuck in my mind at the end of the programme were two words which she used to describe her position and which she felt adequately described the position of the people with whom she had been working for the three months of the programme. She said that she felt powerless and invisible. That is with wages councils in existence, and she still felt powerless, invisible and unable to do anything about it. How much worse will the situation become when those wages councils are abolished?
The Government may well be prepared to abandon these people, to be pleased that they are powerless and to regard them as invisible. Opposition Members are not; we will not abandon them; we will continue to defend them. If the wages councils are abolished, it will be scandalous. None the less, those people can find some solace from the fact that there are those of us who are prepared to stand up for them, argue for them and ensure that they get a decent standard of living and a job that enables them to live with dignity. That is something which the Government and the Ministers will have to live with if they proceed with this obnoxious suggestion of abolishing wages councils.

Mr. Robert Ainsworth: I shall be as brief as I can, having been allowed to speak on the earlier clause.
We sat for a couple of months in the Committee discussing the issues and, at the end, were congratulated by the Chairman on having dealt with some politically controversial issues in a correct parliamentary way. The only time when that broke down was during the discussion on the abolition of wages councils, when there was a great deal of anger on our side of the Committee. I cannot quite


get the anger out of my system now at the proposal under discussion and I know that that feeling is shared by many of my hon. Friends.
The proposal is born of a number of things. It is born out of right-wing ideology and, as has been said by one or two Conservative Members, originated from the think tanks. It is born out of the naked protection and enhancement of vested interests. The only company to have been quoted by the Minister in Committee as having made representations in favour of the abolition of wages councils is Forte. When we pushed the Secretary of State for Employment for a response as to who had made representations to her in favour of the abolition of wages councils, she mentioned hoteliers. The measure is the product of the representations of vested interests.
As was said earlier, the measure is also the product of the instability in the Government. Against the backwoodsmen in their own ranks, they are attempting to push through some pragmatic policies on Europe and they are having to dress themselves up as right-wing ideologues to attempt to keep their coalition together and maintain some semblance of unity. They are doing that at the expense of the weakest people in society.
There is no justification for the abolition of wages councils; we heard none whatsoever in Committee and we have yet to hear any tonight. We all wait with bated breath for the Minister to stand up and give us the first justification for the abolition of wages councils. What we have heard from him is Orwellian double-talk about the abolition of wages councils. He asked why, although the Labour Government abolished certain wages councils, Labour Members are now opposed to the abolition of wages councils. The position is now totally changed. If a wages council had become completely and absolutely obsolete, as many of them did because they no longer provided a safety net as the bargaining arrangements within a particular industry had taken the rates of pay way above any national minimum, at a time when standards of living had risen across the board and there was sustained full employment, there was obviously no need for certain wages councils to continue. They became an anachronism and a complete waste of time. We are now talking about the abolition of the remaining wages councils when the need for them has never been greater in modern times.
Statistics on current living standards which have been released by a number of organisations prove that the gap between the richest and the poorest in Britain is wider than it has been since 1886. I suggest that the conditions prevailing in 1886 led right hon. and hon. Members at the time to the conclusion that there was a need for some safety-net legislation on wages. That was the reason for the introduction of wages councils in the first place. We are now moving back towards a position in which that legislation is necessary. The reason for its existence is the reason behind the proposals for its abolition.
The only weakness in wages councils is the refusal effectively to enforce existing legislation and to extend it to areas where it is clearly inadequate. Some new industries are not covered by wages councils when they should be —the example that always jumps out at me is the security industry, where there are the most appalling rates of pay

—yet the Government have refused to extend wages councils legislation into those industries. Now we are faced with the total abolition of the system.
In Committee we heard arguments from Conservative Members—although we have not heard any such arguments from them tonight—for the total application of the market. This is not a debate on the economy and we have to decide for ourselves whether the Government in this day and age and in a so-called democracy have any role to play in saying that a certain standard of living should apply to the citizens of our country—not an extravagant standard by any means, but some minimum standard that we believe it is our responsibility to protect. If we do not believe in that and if we do not believe that the Government have any responsibility in those matters, we should vote for the abolition of wages councils, but if we do, we should oppose it.
We are talking about a blatant abuse of privilege and power at the expense of the weakest in our society. That is what the Government are attempting to push through the House tonight without any adequate defence of their proposals.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: We have been discussing amendments about producing reports to Parliament, but we have heard a number of speeches about the principle of the abolition of wages councils and I shall try briefly to deal with some of the arguments that have been made tonight.
The most extraordinary statement that has been made repeatedly by a number of hon. Members was the criticism of my right hon. and hon. Friends for not having made speeches in favour of Opposition amendments. It is true that two of my hon. Friends did so, but it is for Opposition Members to make their own case for the new clause and amendments that they have tabled.
A number of hon. Members have drawn attention to the attendance on the Conservative Benches. I will not embarrass Opposition Members by pointing out the attendance on their side of the House. Those arguments do not advance their case.

Mr. Salmond: Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Forsyth: No, I shall deal with some of the arguments first.
There has also been a disgraceful suggestion, which came first from the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson), that the proposals to abolish wages councils had something to do with vested interests in the Conservative party.
The hon. Gentleman might like to reflect on the position that the Labour party has taken on the matter. The Labour Government abolished 11 wages councils. They did so because the trade unions asked them to do so and it is the trade unions that run and fund the Labour party. If the hon. Gentleman wants to talk about vested interests, he might reflect on the fact that the Labour party's position on wages councils has been stood on its head as the trade unions have changed their position from opposing wages councils to being in favour of them.
What has brought about that transformation? I venture to suggest that the Labour Government abolished wages councils at the behest of the trade unions because the trade unions believed that they could organise collective bargaining on a scale which would mean that they would be able to recruit members. As their membership has


declined, they have decided that wages councils are quite good because the members of the unions can sit on the boards of wages councils and determine wages and conditions, although they are no longer able to attract the membership which gives them the authority to do the same. Let us not hear anything about vested interests in wages councils.

Mr. Malcolm Chisholm: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Forsyth: I should like to make a little progress. I do not think that the hon. Gentleman has been in the House throughout the debate.
The hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras asked, with an air of puzzlement, why British hotels were more expensive. He did not believe that wages had anything to do with the efficiency of the companies. Ninety per cent. of the representations that we received on wages councils from the business community supported their abolition.
Employers and people affected by wages councils say that the councils are destroying jobs—not, as the hon. Member for Glasgow, Central (Mr. Watson) and others have suggested, because they are setting especially high rates of pay, but because they have set, in the hotel industry, for example, which seems to interest the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras, increases that are well above the rate of inflation. In one year the increase was 9 per cent., which must be given not simply to those who are affected by the wages council orders but to other employees to maintain differentials. If we are in a period of economic difficulty—[Interruption.] I am sorry that hon. Members find it funny. At least the Government's policies are directed at removing the barriers to employment and creating opportunities for recovery. Only Opposition Members would advocate increasing wages by more than employers can afford in a recession.

Mrs. Angela Browning: Will my hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Forsyth: I shall give way in a moment. The notion that a committee sitting in London can set wage levels that are above people's ability to pay, and that that will not result in jobs being lost, would be absurd and could be held only by people who have never had any experience of employing people. That is certainly true of most Opposition Members who have spoken in the debate.

Mrs. Browning: Does my hon. Friend agree that many hoteliers, especially in the west country—I represent Tiverton in Devon—are not national or multinational companies? Often, they are proprietors of small, family-run hotels who do not have the enormous salaries which Opposition Members claim directors and owners have. We hope that those people will create job opportunities and we rely on them to do so. I have received representations from those people, not the Fortes of this world.

Mr. Forsyth: I agree with my hon. Friend. She makes another important point: by setting national rates., wages councils do not take account of local conditions. They may set rates which are appropriate in London but which are inappropriate for regional areas. My hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) made that point, but he could not quite bring himself to support the general thrust of our policy.

Mr. Salmond: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Forsyth: No, I want to deal with the points which have been made.

Mr. Salmond: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Forsyth: If the hon. Gentleman wishes to intervene at a later stage, I shall happily give way to him. If he thinks that I am frit of any intervention that he could make, I assume that his intervention will be a lot more plausible than his speech, with which I shall deal in a moment.
My hon. Friend the Member for Eltham said that, when he was a Minister at the Department, he accepted the idea that wages councils would cost jobs. I hope that I am not misquoting him in the way in which he misquoted me.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I apologise if I misquoted my hon. Friend. I quote him less often than he quotes me. Each time he has quoted me, he has left out any sense of proportion. I have accepted that the wages councils may have some employment effect. I put it to my hon. Friend —perhaps he can respond to this when he refers to economics—that if we accept the study which shows that a 1 per cent. change in real pay has a 1 per cent. effect on employment, why have not the Government, with their pay policy for public sector workers, rolled back their pay, as is likely to happen to people in the wages council industries?
If a 1 per cent. change to employment in wages council industries is likely to be at the cost of an 18 per cent. change in the rate of pay for statutory wages orders, why does not the Minister say so explicitly so that we can see that he believes that a mere £1 in £5 reduction in pay may lead to a 1 per cent. increase in employment?

Mr. Forsyth: My hon. Friend is barking up the wrong tree. The argument put forward by employers to the Department—it is one that has certainly persuaded me —is that, by setting increases for those workers who are within the scope of wages councils orders, which, to maintain differentials, are above the rate of inflation, the pay bill is increased by more than would otherwise be the case and jobs are lost.
My hon. Friend the Member for Eltham acknowledges that wages councils may cost jobs. He said that he was not prepared to accept the consequences of the abolition of wages councils. It is easy for people who have the comfort and security of employment to advocate policies that will result in jobs no longer being available to the people involved.
The hon. Member for Halifax (Mrs. Mahon), who is not in her place, gave the House a great lecture on the evils of law-breaking. She complained about the failure of wages councils' inspectors to enforce the law. I said that the cases outlined in the programme were not referred by the journalist to the wages council inspectorate. I referred those cases to the inspectorate as soon as I saw the programme. I am sorry that the hon. Lady is not here. It ill-behoves someone who was a leading proponent of non-payment of the poll tax to lecture the House on the virtues of obeying the law.

Mr. George Foulkes: So the Minister supported the poll tax?

Mr. Forsyth: Of course, as a loyal member of the Government, I supported the poll tax.
The hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Carlile) talked about poverty and said how worried he was about the abolition of the wages councils in the context of poverty. The greatest single source of poverty is unemployment. The hon. and learned Gentleman advocates a policy which would result in fewer people being in work. People in work whose income is insufficient for their needs will be given support through the benefits system in the form of family credit or other benefits. From the point of view of poverty, it is better for people to be in a low-paid job than in no job at all.
The hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson) talked about the importance of wages councils in his constituency. Listening to the speeches of Opposition Members, one could be forgiven for thinking that wages councils covered the whole economy—everyone in every area. One would not imagine that we were talking about bodies which provide protection for 10 per cent. of the work force. If that protection is so essential, how do the other 90 per cent. of the work force get by without them?

Mr. Graham: The Minister suggests that the 10 per cent. of the work force covered by wages councils is unimportant. Eastwood district council is a well-known Tory council. The Member of Parliament for that constituency is a Minister. Yet it sees the importance of maintaining the wages councils. If some Tories do not see the reason for that, why do the rest?

Mr. Forsyth: Eastwood is a splendid council. It is right on most things. If what the hon. Gentleman says is correct, it goes to show that the exception proves the rule.
My hon. Friend the Member for Broxstowe (Mr. Lester) spoke about the importance of the wages councils and said that he could not agree with the change that we were introducing. He said that he was against a minimum wage, but in favour of wages councils because they set minimum wages in different sectors of the economy. He argued that a minimum wage would not be appropriate across the economy. I agree with that.
Perhaps my hon. Friend might reflect on the argument which my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton (Mrs. Browning) put to the House. Just as one cannot set a fixed floor for wages across the economy because of the differing nature of industries, one cannot set wages across the country because it varies from one part to another in particular industries. That is the difficulty with wages councils. It is exactly the problem that he identified.
The hon. Member for Renfrew, West and Inverclyde (Mr. Graham) talked about the problems of poverty in his constituency. I sympathise entirely with the difficulties that he described, but wages councils add to those difficulties. They do not make them better.

Mr. Bob Cryer: Who says?

Mr. Forsyth: If the hon. Gentleman wished to listen to the arguments, he could have attended the debate. He was not here. He sails in and finds it possible to comment on a debate that he did not hear.
The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) told us that 100 years ago Scotland set the highest wages in the world and had a high-productivity, high-efficiency economy. That was before wages councils existed. The hon. Gentleman should learn the lesson to which he drew

the attention of the House: that if one wants to have a high-wage economy, one must have a competitive economy. That is what we had in 19th century Scotland, as he told the House.

Mr. Salmond: We do not argue for Victorian values; we prefer the Edwardian values of Winston Churchill. This is not an argument about the economy; wages councils are a matter of decency—a matter that the Minister has not addressed at all. Throughout the debate, the Minister has swept aside the argument that no other Conservative Member has been prepared to argue the Government's case. Can he, having been in the House of Commons for 10 years, recall another reasonably substantial debate in which all speeches, except those of Ministers, have been against the position of the Government? Can he recall one such debate?

Mr. Forsyth: When I was at the Scottish Office, it seemed that all the debates were like that.
The hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (Mr. Hutton) made a very emotional speech, in which he said that tonight we were breaking a consensus of 80 years. He completely forgot that the consensus on wages councils was first broken by a Government of his party, when they abolished 11 councils covering 500,000 workers.
The hon. Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Ainsworth) said that this was all a plot by right-wing ideologues in the think tanks. Opposition Members should think very hard at a time when large employers in Britain say that wages councils are keeping and putting people out of work. The Government's first priority is to get Britain back to work. If that means removing barriers to employment such as wages councils, we shall do so.
I urge the House to reject the new clauses and amendments.

Mr. Dobson: The Minister has given a totally inadequate response to the points made during the debate. The Tory party has managed to put up one Member in support of the abolition of wages councils. It is totally unsatisfactory to suggest that 2·7 million of the worst-paid people in this country–2 million of them women—should be put in danger of having their wages cut to enable the Tory party to pay off its general election debts to a few rich bosses. If the Minister denies that that is what is happening, why will not he publish all the representations that have been made? Is not the reason that too many of those people are saying, "Thank you for abolishing wages councils. That is why we gave you the money before the general election"?

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time:—

The House divided: Ayes 262, Noes 290.

Division No. 152]
[9.11 pm


AYES


Abbott, Ms Dianec
Bayley, Hugh


Adams, Mrs Irene
Beckett, Margaret


Ainger, Nick
Beggs, Roy


Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)
Benn, Rt Hon Tony


Allen, Graham
Bennett, Andrew F.


Alton, David
Benton, Joe


Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)
Bermingham, Gerald


Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)
Berry, Dr. Roger


Armstrong, Hilary
Betts, Clive


Ashton, Joe
Blair, Tony


Austin-Walker, John
Boateng, Paul


Barnes, Harry
Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)


Barron, Kevin
Boyce, Jimmy


Battle, John
Boyes, Roland






Bradley, Keith
Hardy, Peter


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Harvey, Nick


Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)
Henderson, Doug


Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)
Heppell, John


Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)
Hill, Keith (Streatham)


Burden, Richard
Hinchliffe, David


Byers, Stephen
Hoey, Kate


Caborn, Richard
Hood, Jimmy


Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)
Howarth, George (Knowsley N)


Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)
Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)


Campbell-Savours, D. N.
Hoyle, Doug


Canavan, Dennis
Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)


Cann, Jamie
Hughes, Roy (Newport E)


Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)
Hughes, Simon (Southwark)


Chisholm, Malcolm
Hume, John


Clapham, Michael
Hutton, John


Clark, Dr David (South Shields)
Ingram, Adam


Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)
Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)


Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)
Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)


Clelland, David
Jamieson, David


Clwyd, Mrs Ann
Johnston, Sir Russell


Coffey, Ann
Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)


Connarty, Michael
Jones, Ieuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)


Cook, Robin (Livingston)
Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)


Corbett, Robin
Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)


Corbyn, Jeremy
Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)


Corston, Ms Jean
Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)


Cousins, Jim
Jowell, Tessa


Cryer, Bob
Keen, Alan


Cummings, John
Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)


Cunliffe, Lawrence
Khabra, Piara S.


Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)
Kilfoyle, Peter


Dafis, Cynog
Kirkwood, Archy


Dalyell, Tam
Leighton, Ron


Darling, Alistair
Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)


Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)
Lestor, Joan (Eccles)


Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)
Lewis, Terry


Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)
Litherland, Robert


Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'I)
Livingstone, Ken


Denham, John
Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)


Dewar, Donald
Llwyd, Elfyn


Dixon, Don
Loyden, Eddie


Dobson, Frank
Lynne, Ms Liz


Donohoe, Brian H.
McAllion, John


Dowd, Jim
McAvoy, Thomas


Dunnachie, Jimmy
McCartney, Ian


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
Macdonald, Calum


Eagle, Ms Angela
McFall, John


Eastham, Ken
McGrady, Eddie


Etherington, Bill
McKelvey, William


Evans, John (St Helens N)
McLeish, Henry


Ewing, Mrs Margaret
McMaster, Gordon


Fatchett, Derek
McNamara, Kevin


Faulds, Andrew
Madden, Max


Field, Frank (Birkenhead)
Mahon, Alice


Fisher, Mark
Mallon, Seamus


Foster, Derek (B'p Auckland)
Marek, Dr John


Foster, Don (Bath)
Marshall, David (Shettleston)


Foulkes, George
Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)


Fraser, John
Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)


Fyfe, Maria
Martlew, Eric


Galbraith, Sam
Maxton, John


Galloway, George
Meale, Alan


Gapes, Mike
Michael, Alun


Garrett, John
Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)


Gerrard, Neil
Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll Bute)


Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Milburn, Alan


Godman, Dr Norman A.
Miller, Andrew


Godsiff, Roger
Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)


Golding, Mrs Llin
Molyneaux, Rt Hon James


Gordon, Mildred
Morgan, Rhodri


Gould, Bryan
Morley, Elliot


Graham, Thomas
Morris, Rt Hon A. (Wy'nshawe)


Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)
Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)


Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)
Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)


Grocott, Bruce
Mowlam, Marjorie


Gunnell, John
Mudie, George


Hain, Peter
Mullin, Chris


Hall, Mike
Murphy, Paul


Hanson, David
Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon





O'Brien, Michael (N W'kshire)
Smyth, Rev Martin (Belfast S)


O'Brien, William (Normanton)
Snape, Peter


O'Hara, Edward
Soley, Clive


Olner, William
Spearing, Nigel


O'Neill, Martin
Spellar, John


Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)


Paisley, Rev Ian
Steinberg, Gerry


Parry, Robert
Stevenson, George


Pendry, Tom
Stott, Roger


Pickthall, Colin
Strang, Dr. Gavin


Pike, Peter L.
Straw, Jack


Pope, Greg
Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)


Powell, Ray (Ogmore)
Taylor, Rt Hon John D. (Strgfd)


Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)
Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)


Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)
Tipping, Paddy


Primarolo, Dawn
Trimble, David


Purchase, Ken
Turner, Dennis


Quin, Ms Joyce
Tyler, Paul


Radice, Giles
Vaz, Keith


Randall, Stuart
Wallace, James


Raynsford, Nick
Walley, Joan


Redmond, Martin
Wardell, Gareth (Gower)


Reid, Dr John
Wareing, Robert N


Roche, Mrs. Barbara
Watson, Mike


Rogers, Allan
Welsh, Andrew


Rooker, Jeff
Wicks, Malcolm


Rooney, Terry
Wigley, Dafydd


Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)
Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)


Ross, William (E Londonderry)
Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)


Rowlands, Ted
Wilson, Brian


Ruddock, Joan
Winnick, David


Salmond, Alex
Wise, Audrey


Sheerman, Barry
Worthington, Tony


Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Wray, Jimmy


Simpson, Alan
Wright, Dr Tony


Skinner, Dennis



Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)
Tellers for the Ayes:


Smith, C. (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)
Mr. Eric Illsley and


Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)
Mr. Andrew Mackinlay.


NOES


Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)
Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)


Aitken, Jonathan
Budgen, Nicholas


Alexander, Richard
Burns, Simon


Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)
Burt, Alistair


Allason, Rupert (Torbay)
Butler, Peter


Amess, David
Butterfill, John


Ancram, Michael
Carlisle, John (Luton North)


Arbuthnot, James
Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)


Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)
Carrington, Matthew


Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)
Carttiss, Michael


Ashby, David
Cash, William


Aspinwall, Jack
Channon, Rt Hon Paul


Atkins, Robert
Chapman, Sydney


Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)
Clappison, James


Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)
Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)


Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)
Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey


Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)
Coe, Sebastian


Baldry, Tony
Congdon, David


Banks, Matthew (Southport)
Conway, Derek


Banks, Robert (Harrogate)
Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)


Bates, Michael
Coombs, Simon (Swindon)


Batiste, Spencer
Cope, Rt Hon Sir John


Bellingham, Henry
Couchman, James


Bendall, Vivian
Cran, James


Beresford, Sir Paul
Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)


Biffen, Rt Hon John
Day, Stephen


Blackburn, Dr John G.
Deva, Nirj Joseph


Body, Sir Richard
Devlin, Tim


Booth, Hartley
Dickens, Geoffrey


Boswell, Tim
Dicks, Terry


Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia
Dorrell, Stephen


Bowden, Andrew
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James


Bowis, John
Duncan, Alan


Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes
Duncan-Smith, Iain


Brazier, Julian
Dunn, Bob


Bright, Graham
Durant, Sir Anthony


Brooke, Rt Hon Peter
Dykes, Hugh


Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)
Eggar, Tim


Browning, Mrs. Angela
Elletson, Harold






Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)
Lang, Rt Hon Ian


Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)
Lawrence, Sir Ivan


Evans, Roger (Monmouth)
Legg, Barry


Evennett, David
Lennox-Boyd, Mark


Faber, David
Lidington, David


Fabricant, Michael
Lilley, Rt Hon Peter


Fenner, Dame Peggy
Lloyd, Peter (Fareham)


Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)
Lord, Michael


Fishburn, Dudley
Luff, Peter


Forman, Nigel
Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas


Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)
MacKay, Andrew


Forth, Eric
Maclean, David


Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman
McLoughlin, Patrick


Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)
McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick


Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)
Madel, David


Freeman, Roger
Maitland, Lady Olga


French, Douglas
Malone, Gerald


Fry, Peter
Mans, Keith


Gale, Roger
Marland, Paul


Gallie, Phil
Marlow, Tony


Gardiner, Sir George
Marshall, John (Hendon S)


Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan
Martin, David (Portsmouth S)


Garnier, Edward
Mawhinney, Dr Brian


Gill, Christopher
Merchant, Piers


Gillan, Cheryl
Milligan, Stephen


Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair
Mills, Iain


Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles
Mitchell, Sir David (Hants NW)


Gorst, John
Moate, Sir Roger


Grant, Sir Anthony (Cambs SW)
Monro, Sir Hector


Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)
Montgomery, Sir Fergus


Greenway, John (Ryedale)
Moss, Malcolm


Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)
Nelson, Anthony


Grylls, Sir Michael
Neubert, Sir Michael


Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn
Newton, Rt Hon Tony


Hague, William
Nicholls, Patrick


Hamilton, Rt Hon Archie (Epsom)
Nicholson, David (Taunton)


Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)
Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)


Hampson, Dr Keith
Norris, Steve


Hanley, Jeremy
Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley


Hannam, Sir John
Oppenheim, Phillip


Hargreaves, Andrew
Ottaway, Richard


Harris, David
Page, Richard


Haselhurst, Alan
Paice, James


Hawkins, Nick
Patnick, Irvine


Hawksley, Warren
Patten, Rt Hon John


Hayes, Jerry
Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey


Heald, Oliver
Pawsey, James


Heathcoat-Amory, David
Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth


Hendry, Charles
Pickles, Eric


Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael
Porter, Barry (Wirral S)


Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.
Porter, David (Waveney)


Hill, James (Southampton Test)
Portillo, Rt Hon Michael


Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)
Powell, William (Corby)


Horam, John
Rathbone, Tim


Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter
Redwood, John


Howard, Rt Hon Michael
Renton, Rt Hon Tim


Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)
Richards, Rod


Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)
Riddick, Graham


Hughes Robert G. (Harrow W)
Rifkind, Rt Hon. Malcolm


Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)
Robathan, Andrew


Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)
Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn


Hunter, Andrew
Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)


Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas
Robinson, Mark (Somerton)


Jack, Michael
Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)


Jackson, Robert (Wantage)
Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela


Jenkin, Bernard
Ryder, Rt Hon Richard


Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey
Sackville, Tom


Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)
Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim


Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)
Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas


Jopling, Rt Hon Michael
Shaw, David (Dover)


Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine
Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)


Key, Robert
Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian


Kilfedder, Sir James
Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)


Kirkhope, Timothy
Shersby, Michael


Knapman, Roger
Sims, Roger


Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)
Skeet, Sir Trevor


Knight, Greg (Derby N)
Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)


Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)
Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)


Kynoch, George (Kincardine)
Soames, Nicholas


Lait, Mrs Jacqui
Speed, Sir Keith





Spencer, Sir Derek
Trend, Michael


Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)
Twinn, Dr Ian


Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)
Vaughan, Sir Gerard


Spink, Dr Robert
Waldegrave, Rt Hon William


Spring, Richard
Walden, George


Sproat, Iain
Walker, Bill (N Tayside)


Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)
Waller, Gary


Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John
Ward, John


Steen, Anthony
Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)


Stephen, Michael
Waterson, Nigel


Stewart, Allan
Watts, John


Streeter, Gary
Wells, Bowen


Sumberg, David
Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John


Sweeney, Walter
Whittingdale, John


Sykes, John
Widdecombe, Ann


Tapsell, Sir Peter
Wiggin, Sir Jerry


Taylor, Ian (Esher)
Willetts, David


Taylor, John M. (Solihull)
Wilshire, David


Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)
Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)


Temple-Morris, Peter
Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)


Thomason, Roy
Wolfson, Mark


Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)
Wood, Timothy


Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)
Yeo, Tim


Thurnham, Peter
Young, Sir George (Acton)


Townend, John (Bridlington)



Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)
Tellers for the Noes:


Tracey, Richard
Mr. David Lightbown and


Tredinnick, David
Mr. Andrew Mitchell.

Question accordingly negatived.

New clause 5

PATERNITY RIGHTS

'.—(1) An employee whose wife or partner has given birth shall be entitled to take ten working days leave (referred to in this section as paternity leave).
(2) Paternity leave can be taken at any time from the birth until the end of three months following the birth.
(3) An employee on paternity leave shall be entitled to full pay.
(4) The employee has the right to decide when to take paternity leave except that the employer must be given:

(a) 21 days' notice of the expected week of confinement of the employee's spouse, and
(b) reasonable notice of the time when paternity leave is taken where that is practicable.

(5) For the purposes of this section a partner includes a man and woman who are not married to each other but are living together as man and wife.'.—[Ms. Quin.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Ms. Joyce Quin: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): With this, I understand that it will be convenient to take the following: New clause 11—Parental leave—

'().—(1) Following the period of maternity leave laid down in section 19 above, each parent shall be entitled to a period of parental leave of either three months full time or six months part-time, such leave not to be taken by both parents concurrently.
(2) The parental leave referred to in subsection (1) above must be completed before the second birthday of the child, save where a registered general medical practitioner certifies that the health of the child requires an extended permit.
(3) The parental leave referred to in subsections (1) and (2) above shall also be available to adoptive parents.'.

New clause 10—Maternity employment rights report—

'(1) The Secretary of State shall publish a report to Parliament annually, to be called "The maternity employment rights report" on the effects of the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Act 1993.
(2) The Report shall assess the effects of the Act on:

(a) the employment opportunities for pregnant working women
(b) access to time off for ante-natal care (including relaxation classes and parentcraft classes)
(c) the operation of remuneration during 14 weeks maternity leave
(d) the number of women returning to work after the 14 weeks maternity leave
(e) the adequacy of 14 weeks maternity leave for the health of the mother and the baby.
(f) the operation and complexity of the scheme
(g) the number of women successfully claiming, unfair dismissal because of pregnancy under this Act
(h) the number of women medically suspended for health and safety reasons each year

(3) Before publishing the Report, the Secretary of State shall consult such organisations as appear to him to be concerned.'.

Government amendments Nos. 1 to 3.

Amendment No. 63, in clause 19, page 37, line 26, leave out 'fourteen' and insert 'eighteen'.

Government amendments Nos. 37, 38 and 4.

Amendment No. 71, in page 38, line 19, at end insert—
'(1A) An employer may apply to an industrial tribunal to set aside this provision on the ground that greater unfairness would be caused to another employee.'.
Government amendments Nos. 5, 6, 43, 44, 39 to 41, 7, 8 and 42.

Ms. Quin: New clause 5 heads a group of new clauses and amendments that deal with maternity rights for women at work, sharing family responsibilities by recognising fathers' rights to paternity and parental leave, and the need for society to support adoptive parents and to take account of their contribution to children's welfare and to that of the community.
In Committee, the Opposition sought via amendments and new clauses to create a comprehensive system of maternity rights. We also aimed to create a system that would be easy to understand and to implement—in stark contrast to the existing confusing and complex system, which in some ways will be made more complex by the introduction of the clauses relating to maternity rights in the Bill.
Opposition Members believe that we should seek to create an effective system of rights that would at least equal, if not surpass, best practice in Europe—something that the Opposition are determined eventually to implement for working women in our country.
New clause 5 deals with paternity leave and stipulates that:
An employee whose wife or partner has given birth shall be entitled to take ten working days leave … Paternity leave can be taken at any time from the birth until the end of three months following the birth … An employee on paternity leave shall be entitled to full pay.
The new clause also deals with the notification requirements that we envisage would be a feasible means of introducing a system of paternity leave.
One of the reasons why we have tabled the new clause is that we deplore the present situation in which fathers have no legal right to paid leave at the time of the birth of their children. That is not good news for fathers, mothers

or babies. Paternity leave requirements of the kind envisaged would allow the sharing of child care responsibilities and would help to establish strong paternal bonds at the birth of the child.
An Equal Opportunities Commission study found that 91 per cent. of fathers favoured the introduction of statutory paternity leave. By introducing such leave, the Government would be taking a step towards implementing article 6 of the European Council's recommendations on child care, which I understand that they supported when it was dealt with in the European Council of Ministers.
The cost of introducing paternity leave would be modest. In a workplace of 500 employees, consisting of 60 per cent. men and 40 per cent. women, it has been calculated that 12 or 13 employees are likely to use it in a year. We believe that the cost would be negligible, and the good will created by employers introducing paternity leave would be great.
A number of paternity leave arrangements already exist in many firms throughout the country. The Minister may respond to the new clause by referring to the good practice that already exists on a voluntary basis, where employers have decided to introduce such arrangements. Although 1 am glad that some employers are enlightened, the argument that was effectively advanced by my hon. Friends in the previous debate about the abolition of wages councils—that the good employer will be undercut by the bad—is just as valid for paternity and parental leave.
9.30 pm
New clause 11 deals with the subject of parental leave. The ideas contained in the new clause are taken from the proposed European Community directive on parental leave which was blocked by the Government in the European Council of Ministers six years ago. We do not pretend that the wording of new clause 11 is perfect. We wanted to embody the principle of parental leave in the new clause. If the Government were prepared to accept the new clause, we would be delighted to negotiate with them and come to a common agreement about the details of the parental leave system.
It is highly regrettable that the Government have always chosen to block the initiative in the European Council of Ministers. That may explain why some of our partners are so keen on the social chapter, which at least allows the other 11 countries to make progress on many of the matters that have been blocked by our Government's negative stance on so much social legislation in the European Community.
Parental leave is common in other European countries. When the matter was last debated in Parliament—I think it was in 1985–10 out of 12 European Community countries already had some form of parental leave entitlement. It is interesting to recall that in the other place their Lordships also favoured the introduction of a statutory period of parental leave. I think that they were in favour of paid parental leave for one month. They certainly did not rule the European proposals out of court in the way that the Government unfortunately did, and continue to do.
Some of the comments that I made about paternity leave on new clause 5 also apply to new clause 11, which specifically refers to the rights of adoptive parents to have some form of parental leave. The European Community draft directive stipulated that adoptive parents would be


able to have such leave at any time within the child's first five years of life, taking into account some of the special circumstances that can surround adoption and the fact that parents do not always adopt newly born babies.
The European Community directive also referred to longer leave for single parents, parents of a handicapped child or where difficulties existed. The Equal Opportunities Commission produced lengthy reports and recommendations supporting the parental leave directive. They are a few years old, but I believe that they are still valid. It also did a cost analysis of the possible effects of introducing parental leave. It said that it would increase the total wages and salaries bills by less than 0·01 per cent. The costs were contested in the House at the time. However, we believe that the Equal Opportunities Commission undertook a serious study on the subject which deserves the Government's attention.
Unfortunately, there has been no progress on the matter since 1986. That is very sad and shows the hypocritical attitude of the Government, who have introduced such initiatives as Opportunity 2000, and who supposedly have a commitment to equal opportunities policy. The sharing of family responsibilities is a crucial way of ensuring that women can play a full part in the workplace. Such measures are vital if having a baby is not to penalise a working woman, and cause her and her family to miss out financially.
I have mentioned leave for adoptive parents. We had an interesting debate on that in Committee: it was one of the occasions when Opposition Members were supported by certain Conservative Members—although, unfortunately, they were not supported by the Minister. The new clause on adoptive parents was tabled by the hon. Member for Bolton, North-East (Mr. Thurnham), and was strongly supported by the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan) and one or two other Conservative Members.
Sadly, the Minister turned a deaf ear to our views. I should be delighted if he announced tonight that he had been converted, for this is yet another area in which we are out of step with many other European countries. Most of them make some provision for leave for adoptive parents. Although some companies in Britain adopt good practice in that respect, the Government's offer in Committee to publicise examples of best practice among employers generally goes nowhere near meeting our concerns. We remain strongly attached to the idea of a statutory right for adoptive parents, and I hope that some Conservative Members will support us.
New clause 10 proposes a maternity employment rights report. We are anxious that the Bill—which, unfortunately, seems likely to come into effect in the form that the Government wish—should at least be evaluated in terms of its effects on women at work, especially in regard to maternity rights. In new clause 10, we ask the Secretary of State to publish an annual report to Parliament on maternity employment rights, and specifically request that the report assess the effects of the Bill—when it is enacted —on different aspects of maternity rights.
For example, we want the report to consider the effects on employment opportunities for pregnant working women, and on access to time off for ante-natal care, including relaxation classes and parentcraft classes. We feel that the Minister's response in Committee was unsatisfactory. He said then that existing United Kingdom legislation was adequate, but he missed the point that

many people are unable to exercise their right to ante-natal care, because their employers will not allow them time off. At present there is no satisfactory remedy in law.
In the new clause, we also ask for information about the operation of remuneration during 14 weeks of maternity leave. We have been concerned all along at the Government's failure to deal with the question of maternity pay. We also regret the fact that, throughout the negotiations on the European directive, our Government were alone in wanting maternity pay to be linked with sick pay rather than salaries. We consider that a disgraceful attitude, which represents a lost opportunity for the women of Britain and, indeed, others in the European Community.
We also want information about the number of women who return to work after their 14 weeks of maternity leave —and, moreover, about the adequacy of 14 weeks' leave for the health of mother and baby. On Second Reading and throughout the Committee stage, we argued strongly that 14 weeks was far too short a period. We continue to believe that. One of our amendments would replace 14 weeks with 18 weeks. Although we shall not ask the House to divide on the 18 weeks amendment, we shall divide the House on new clause 10 in order to make clear that we are in favour of 18 weeks rather than 14 weeks.
If the Minister were suddenly to say in reply that he accepts our argument and those of all the other organisations that have lobbied hard for the period of 18 weeks rather than 14 weeks, I should be only too happy not to divide the House on new clause 10. I have the feeling, however, that the Minister is unlikely to give us what we want. Nevertheless, the Government are very much in the minority on this issue. Most people feel that 18 weeks is the minimum period needed if the health of the mother and the baby are to be protected properly. Many women who have worked the statutory period for their current employer have the right to return up to 29 weeks after the birth of their baby. Therefore, it is absurd for the Government to believe that a maternity leave period of only 14 weeks is right for other women. We feel very strongly that that is unsatisfactory. I am sure that my hon. Friends will reinforce that point during the debate.
In asking for a report, we also want information about the operation and complexity of the scheme. We feel that the existing scheme is muddled because of the different periods of maternity leave and also because of the different requirements about the giving of notice. It will not be easy for employers to understand exactly what they will have to comply with. If it will not be easy for employers, it will be even more difficult for pregnant employees—who probably have got other things on their mind than checking notification periods and their entitlement to maternity leave—to understand these complexities. I hope that the Government will take due note of that point.
We should also like information about the number of women who have successfully claimed that they were unfairly dismissed because of pregnancy. There was considerable discussion in Committee about the rules governing pregnant women at work and unfair dismissal. Some progress was made. We were glad, for example, that the Government accepted that the unfair dismissal period should be extended after maternity leave for a further period, particularly if the mother is suffering from health problems as a result of having given birth. Nevertheless, we still believe that the position over unfair dismissal is unsatisfactory.
I was not entirely reassured by the letter that the Minister sent to me on this matter on 28 January. It dealt with the amendment that we tabled in Committee whose purpose was to ensure that the burden of proof would be on the employer rather than the employee in dismissal cases. The position is still very unsatisfactory for those women who do not meet the qualifying period of two years full time and five years part time. The employer could simply say that dismissal was for reasons other than pregnancy. The employee would have no protection against unfair dismissal for those other reasons because she would not have worked for the qualifying period.
Although the Minister has taken a decision about the issue, I hope that he will be open to further representations as the Bill goes through the other place. I know that many organisations are concerned about the matter, including the Maternity Alliance and the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux. They are keen to take up this matter again with the Minister. They feel that the assurances that we were given in Committee do not go far enough to meet the real needs of some women who have found themselves in a difficult position at work, we suspect because of their pregnancy, because employers have been able to say, "Oh, well, it's for other reasons"—for lateness or anything else that they could think of in order conveniently to dispense with the services of those women rather than have to guarantee their employment after they return from maternity leave.
I deal now with the Government amendments to this part of the Bill. Some were clearly tabled in response to concerns that we expressed in Committee and in response to representations that have been made to them. We are pleased about some of the amendments but feel that others could go further.
9.45 pm
We are pleased that the Government have altered the rules about the triggering of the maternity leave period. In that respect, the original draft of the Bill seemed very strange and would have meant that women were forced to leave work when neither they nor their employer wanted them to. It seemed absurd, so we are glad that the Government have taken the opportunity to harmonise part of the existing maternity pay scheme with the new maternity leave scheme by allowing a woman to receive sick pay if she is ill between 11 and six weeks before the baby is due. However, it would have been far more sensible for the Government to have harmonised the two schemes further by extending maternity leave to 18 weeks. This is another reason why we believe that it is important to have an 18-week leave period.
I refer the Government to a National Audit Office report on statutory sick and maternity pay which was published in January after the Committee had covered this part of the Bill. The report makes it clear that the stated objective of the statutory maternity pay scheme is
to encourage women not to endanger their or their babies' health by working too late into their pregnancies, or returning to work too soon after their babies are born".
Again, we believe that 14 weeks' leave is insufficient. Even if a woman starts her maternity leave six weeks before the birth, she will have only seven or eight weeks' maternity leave after the week of the baby's birth, which could well be too short in some circumstances.
The Government have introduced changes to the notice requirement for the 14 weeks' maternity leave, but we still believe that the changes, contained in amendments Nos. 1,

3, 4, and 8, are too complex because different notification requirements will apply to women taking 14 weeks' leave and those taking up to 40 weeks' leave. The Government have again missed an opportunity to simplify the scheme for the benefit of all involved.
Women will have to rely on employers to provide information on maternity leave. The same report from the National Audit Office revealed that half of the employers contacted did not provide adequate information on the SMP scheme. Clearly the Government have a great deal of work to do to ensure that the provisions will be implemented correctly but, up to now, there seems little evidence that the Government are prepared to do it.
I mentioned the Government's changes to the protection for women against unfair dismissal if women cannot return after maternity leave because they are unwell. Although we welcome the provision, we agree with organisations such as the Maternity Alliance, which feel that it is very limited because the protection will last for only four weeks. Perhaps the Minister will explain why he decided to offer protection for four weeks and no more.
We should also like the Minister to explain what would happen to a woman who, through no fault of her own, was unable to provide a medical certificate before the end of her maternity leave. For example, what would happen if her leave ended at the weekend and she fell ill during the weekend and therefore technically missed the date for notifying her employer that she was applying for extended leave on medical grounds?
The Government also tabled a wholly unsatisfactory amendment in response to concerns that we expressed in Committee. We were concerned that it was technically possible, due to the strange drafting of the Bill, for a woman to be forced back to work before her child was born.
The Government have sought to deal with that by providing that an employee's maternity leave will continue for 14 weeks or until the birth of the child if later. On superficial reading at least, that suggests that the minute a woman had given birth she would have to go back to work. Would she be expected to go back to work straight from the hospital? There is the additional four-week protection against unfair dismissal, but it is not right that a woman should have to rely on what is effectively sick leave to obtain adequate maternity leave in those circumstances.
I refer the Government to the EC pregnancy directive. It does not specifically require a period of leave after the birth because the relevant article refers to before and/or after the birth, but the whole purpose of the directive is to safeguard the safety and health of workers who have recently given birth.
It could be argued that the Government are failing properly to abide by the terms of the EC equal treatment directive which talks about the period during which problems due to pregnancy and confinement may arise, and which obviously therefore refers to the period before and after the birth.
Certainly the National Audit Office report, to which I have referred, states that the purpose of the statutory maternity pay scheme is to encourage women not to return to work too soon after their babies are born. The Government's amendment does not seem to comply with that commitment. If the Government are not prepared to change it tonight, they should at least undertake to


consider the matter further so that it can be dealt with satisfactorily at a subsequent stage in the Bill's proceedings.
Amendment No. 63 reiterates our strong feeling that the maternity leave period should be 18 weeks rather than 14 weeks. I pay tribute to the Maternity Alliance campaign on the matter and, in particular, its publication "One last push for 18 weeks" in which it gives some strong reasons why the leave period should be 18 rather than 14 weeks.
The Maternity Alliance says that the primary purpose of maternity leave is to protect the well-being of mother and baby and it questions whether 14 weeks is long enough to do that. It says, rightly, that it is Government policy to encourage breast feeding for the first four to six months of a baby's life and a 14-week maternity leave period is not consistent with that.
The Maternity Alliance says that finding child care for young babies is particularly difficult, making it unlikely that many women with a baby a few weeks old would be able to return to work. It also says that many women stop work about 11 weeks before the birth of the baby because of tiredness or illness and such women would have to resume work when their babies are only about three weeks old.
Therefore, 18 weeks makes great sense. It also makes sense because, as I have said before, many women in Britain are entitled to a longer maternity leave and, on average, British women take 20 weeks' maternity leave. Therefore, it would be much more sensible to harmonise upwards rather than downwards. As employers already administer for 18 weeks statutory maternity pay, it makes sense for 18 weeks to be the general leave period.
We believe, with the Maternity Alliance, that the cost to employers and the Government of extending maternity leave by four weeks to 18 weeks would be minimal and it would be offset by savings. More women would return to work saving employers recruitment and training costs and saving the Government tax income and benefit cost.
In conclusion, women's working lives are greatly affected by having children and we do not want the fact of giving birth to mean that women lose out. We do not want them to lose an interesting and worthwhile job. We do not want them to lose the chance of promotion, and we do not want them to handicap themselves, sometimes severely from a financial point of view, simply because they have chosen to have children.
Working mothers need a better deal than is being given to them in the Bill. If they are given a better deal, not only they but society will greatly benefit.

Mr. Alex Carlile: I should like to say a few words, particularly in support of new clause 5, but first I thank the Minister for introducing changes in the rules triggering maternity leave. Some improvement is better than no improvement at all.
Times have changed a good deal since those pictures which we see exemplified in old episodes of "Doctor Finlay's Casebook" and "Doctor in the House", when the midwife turned up, the kettle was put on and the expectant father was sent out to the pub while mother and the midwife arranged for the baby to be born, and then the father returned to look at his son and heir, or so he hoped.
Fortunately, things have changed a good deal since then and when a child is born into a family—we should all be aiming to uphold the integrity of the family in these ever-more difficult times for family life—it is now

recognised as very desirable that, not just the mother, but the father of the child should form a relationship with the baby quickly and take an active part in looking after the baby. Fathers do much more than merely change nappies these days. That in itself is an advance on the situation 20 or 30 years ago. Fathers play an active and significant role in the upbringing of babies, and it is right that they should.
So new clause 5 recognises the changing times. Secondly, it recognises the realities of modern life, with particular reference to work and the workplace. For many families now it cannot possibly be taken for granted that the father is the breadwinner. In many families the father and the mother of the child have more or less equal incomes and in many families the mother of the newborn child is the breadwinner. If the father is to become the house husband and if, as in an increasing number of families, he is to stay at home and look after the child, or to spend a considerable time at home looking after the child, it is desirable and sensible that the father should form a bond with the baby as quickly as the mother. Paternity leave seems to be a sensible way of achieving that.
I apprehend that there are some Conservative Members, male hon. Members, who find this a faintly hilarious subject but it is not. It is extremely important that babies should be brought up, from the beginning, in stable homes and if that means that we should recognise what has already been recognised in other countries, that paternity leave is a contributory factor towards that, we should not lag behind other countries in Europe in introducing paternity leave.
The third point that I wish to raise on new clause 5 is one that was not raised by the hon. Lady the Member for Gateshead, East (Ms. Quin) in her full and excellent presentation of the case on a number of issues, including this clause. My point relates to the all too frequent and sometimes extremely sad onset of puerperal depression. In my professional life as a lawyer, I have had the misfortune to come across the sometimes tragic effects in a family of post-natal depression, particularly in cases where there has not been the support and involvement of the father that one would have hoped for.
I believe that paternity leave would mean that both parents would be together, at least for a time, after the birth of a child and that the support that the father would give the mother would lessen the prospects of serious post-natal depression. That is an important point because, as the Minister knows and I suspect all hon. Members know, puerperal depression is a very common incident of childbirth.
I would also like to say a word about new clause 10. Whether the precise wording is right, in my view, matters not. What new clause 10 would achieve is a way of measuring the success of maternity leave. It would provide a method of producing statistics which would enable not only us, but, more important, the medical profession, employers and trade unions to measure the success or otherwise of the maternity leave regime. It would enable us to know whether justice was being done to mothers and, of course, to their children. Without statistics of the sort that would be provided by the report suggested, we are not really in a position to judge.
Hon. Members who put down parliamentary questions—

It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 14 (Exempted business),
That, at this day's sitting, the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill may be proceeded with, though opposed, until any hour.—["Mr. Kirkhope.]

Question agreed to.

As amended, again considered.

Question again proposed, That the clause be read a Second time.

Mr. Carlile: Hon. Members who table questions to Ministers know that it is sometimes difficult to obtain the types of statistics which are referred to in the categories set out in new clause 10. This would enable us and others to have those statistics. I really cannot understand why the Government appear to want to resist the preparation of a report of a type which has now become very common as an adjunct of new statutory provisions, and I hope that the Minister will reflect afresh upon this matter.

Mr. Miller: I shall be brief, bearing in mind that other hon. Members wish to speak.
Referring first to new clause 5, many progressive employers provide some form of paternity leave. My progressive previous employer—the Minister made a number of jokes about it in Committee—provided me with paternity leave some 14 years ago when my daughter was born. I and my family found that, and my daughter found it eventually, a very beneficial provision. The arguments are clearly set out in the clause. But, aside from odd employers, as the Minister would probably consider trade unions, many good employers provide some form of provision for paternity leave.
It seems to me that it would disadvantage those good employers if the cowboys were allowed to maintain standards lower than those applied by the best. So I think that there is an economic argument that supports the development of a clause creating a consistent provision and a right throughout our society.
With regard to new clause 10, the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Carlile) made a good point about the need to collate statistical evidence. It is only when that evidence is collated properly that we will know whether the Government's attempts at reform in this area, some of which are opposed and some of which are accepted by Opposition Members, are appropriate and will be able to analyse the facts and make some progress.
I draw the attention of the House in particular to paragraphs (g) and (h) of subsection (2) concerning the number of women successfully claiming unfair dismissal because of pregnancy. This is particularly important. A number of cases have gone through the tribunal and higher courts relating to dismissals that have been alleged redundancies during periods of maternity leave, and so on. This information is loosely collated. I believe that it needs to be collated in the context of this clause rather than in the generality of overall case law statistics.
If we look at it in the context of other aspects of the clause, we will begin to understand the meaning of the statistics. Equally, and in some respects more importantly, the same argument applies to paragraph (h). Inevitably, there will be cases in which women are suspended for health and safety reasons. However, it is important. to separate genuine health-related reasons from concocted reasons because, in the later stages of pregnancy, a woman

may not be able to fulfil a task at the same pace as, for example, young, fit Ministers; but perhaps that is not the case.
Against that background, and for the powerful reasons set out by my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East (Ms. Quin) and by the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery, I shall support new clause 10.

Ms. Eagle: I shall spend a short time on some of the history of the new rights established in the Bill. Clearly, the Opposition welcome any conversion of the Government to improving employment rights, albeit in a grudging and technical way. They have reacted to being dragged kicking and screaming by the European Commission into making at least some concession to the needs of women in the work force.
Let us examine the history of the provisions and why the Government, who spend most of their time wanting to reduce what they euphemistically call burdens on business, have suddenly introduced a measure which, albeit grudgingly, slightly increases those burdens on business. That has come about simply because of the EC directive on maternity leave in which the British Government played a pretty villainous role, first in holding up its progress through the EC institutions and secondly, when they realised that they could not hold it up much longer, in watering it down. They insisted that they would not agree to the original draft of the directive which granted maternity pay at 90 per cent. of earnings and would support the directive only if maternity pay was reduced to the level of sick pay. Far from being 90 per cent. of what a pregnant woman was earning before her pregnancy, levels of statutory sick pay in Britain are about 15 per cent. of average earnings, which in real and proportional terms is a much lower level than that which could have been achieved had the Government been less destructive in its dealings with the EC.
Having held up the directive and then watered it down, the Government then abstained on it, so they did not even vote for it. The Government have accepted pretty grudgingly that increased maternity rights should be granted to millions of women in the work force today and the millions of women who may want to join the work force if they are given equal treatment and rights by British laws.
Although we must congratulate the Government on the rights they are bringing in, our congratulations must be fairly narrow. The Government have brought in those rights in a typical technical and grudging way.
The law contains a right to maternity leave somewhere. However, one must search high and low, and one must be virtually a lawyer of international repute to understand those rights, much less attempt to exercise them.
What we have is a technical granting of a right with absolutely no attempt being made by the Government to tackle the real problem of the piecemeal approach to equal opportunities legislation in the United Kingdom. Indeed, the Government have introduced the right to maternity leave—which is welcome—in the most complex way possible in the hope that it will be so perplexing that many people will not, first, realise that they have the right and, secondly, be able to work out how they should exercise it. That applies to both employers and employees.
I would prefer to see—the Equal Opportunities Commission is on record as saying this about the Bill—the Government make a genuine attempt to deal with their


piecemeal approach to current equal opportunities legislation and simplify it rather than introduce a third tier to an already complex system. The Government should simplify the system to one tier so that people may know that they have a simple right which is easily applied for. People would know what they were entitled to and they could go on to deal with the normal everyday problems with pregnancy and the arrangements which they must make as they approach confinement in a more optimistic way without the uncertainty and insecurity which currently surround maternity leave at work.
The rights introduced by the Government should be more generous. I certainly support the view that we should have an 18-week leave period rather than 14 weeks. My hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East (Ms. Quin) has dealt effectively with some of the more bizarre aspects of the way in which the legislation is drafted. There are many issues which we will want to assess. We will want to see how the right is being used and whether it makes much practical difference.
The reason for new clause 10 is to produce a statistical digest to deal with some of the issues—how complex the scheme is, whether people are able to use it and the number of women who successfully claim unfair dismissal because of pregnancy, as they are given a right to do so under the legislation. That right is grudgingly given in the same way as maternity rights are given. Women must prove, rather than the employer having to disprove, that they were sacked for being pregnant, which is a difficult thing to do. If the Government intended to give proper and appropriate protection to women in the work force, they would have switched the burden of proof in the way in which the new right was introduced. New clause 10 deals with those issues.
It gives me a sense of pride and a special feeling that, as one of only 10 per cent. of women Members in the House, I can represent the interests of women on this important issue. Women can take their rightful place in society only with a guarantee of proper equal treatment. The Government's attempts to introduce some sort of limited new employment rights are woefully inadequate. I look forward to their doing much better in the near future.

Mr. Burden: I rise to support the new clauses and the amendment proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East (Ms. Quin). I want to speak to new clause 10 because it seems to be especially important that we compile the sort of statistics which are being advocated on the impact of the maternity leave changes which the Government wish to introduce.
To hear Ministers talk, one would think that they were introducing proposals which would transform the rights of working women. In Britain, not only will the impact of what is being suggested—welcome though it is—be somewhat more limited: it will produce a rather selective view of how the legislation came to be before the House in the first place.
10.15 pm
My hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms. Eagle) catalogued what took place when the European Commission and the Council of Ministers considered the pregnant women at work directive. The delays caused principally by the British Government held up that

directive for no less than two years. Indeed, the timing was so tight by the end of that period that in order to ratify the directive before it lapsed, Ministers had to do so at a meeting about fisheries. As we have heard, even at that stage the Government, having watered down the directive, could not bring themselves to vote for it and abstained. One would think that it was hardly worth the air fare for them to go over there to do it.
If the Government had not watered it down, the directive could have provided women with the right to 16 weeks paid time off for maternity. The Government not only reduced that to 14 weeks but watered down the pay provisions. They do not even mention maternity pay in the Bill. Indeed, they have ruled out any consideration of maternity pay as if the issue were irrelevant to maternity leave.
It is instructive to examine why it was so important to the Government to rule out consideration of maternity pay. A quick look through the level of maternity pay in other countries in Europe shows why the Government are so bashful. The total equivalent maternity pay in other European countries is as follows: Denmark 22 weeks, Italy 17 weeks, Luxembourg 16 weeks, Greece 16 weeks, the Netherlands 16 weeks, Germany 14 weeks, France 13½1 weeks, Spain 12 weeks, Belgium 11 weeks and Ireland 10 weeks.
Ministers will probably say that the directive advocated at least 14 weeks and many women will receive more than that. True enough, but in Britain the equivalent total weeks of maternity pay for women who have worked full time for more than two years is the princely period of eight weeks. Women who do not meet that requirement receive the equivalent of four weeks in total. That is the reality of maternity leave in Britain. That is why new clause 5 and the other new clauses in the group are important.
One cannot separate out the issue of maternity pay, all the more so because the Government have insisted on scrapping the wages councils. The effect of that will be to drive the earnings of many thousands of women below the national insurance threshold. That will remove their entitlement to the higher rate of statutory maternity pay. So it will increase the problems of poverty among women employees.
We have already heard that the maternity leave period advocated by the Government is too short. All expert opinion agrees that 14 weeks simply is not long enough for the health of the mother, the family or the baby. In Britain the need to extend the period from 14 weeks to 18 weeks is even more important than in other parts of Europe because the Government have refused and refused again to introduce any scheme of parental or paternity leave. That makes the need for a decent scheme for maternity leave that much more important.
In eight out of 12 European countries there is some provision for paternity or parental leave. Why in Britain do we come up against a brick wall when we seek such provisions? In the United States of America there is movement on leave for family reasons. The measure is supported by large parts of the Republican party. So why in Britain does a brick wall still go up on paternity and parental leave?
My hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey also described the complexity of the rules introduced in the Bill. That is yet another reason why we must consider the impact of the Bill. If a woman is to find her way through the myriad rules, regulations and laws on maternity leave


she needs to be an expert in employment law and pretty good at lateral thinking. If she works for one length of time she qualifies for something called maternity leave. If she works for another period she has no entitlement to maternity leave beyond 14 weeks but she qualifies for something called the right of return.
The notification requirements are different, as are the rules and regulations about what one is able to accrue in terms of contractual rights. That is the effect of provisions of this type. Under the Bill in its original form we had the crazy situation of a woman having to go back to work before having her baby. Fortunately, the Government saw sense to some extent and removed that provision. However, as my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East pointed out, a woman might now have to return to work the day after having her baby. I suppose that that is an improvement, but it will not be much consolation to the women involved.
A woman has to jump through very difficult hoops in order to find reality in terms of the rights that she will receive under this Bill. In Committee we heard about a woman whose employer had denied her access to ante-natal classes on the ground that such an arrangement was not company policy. That is not unique. We have heard about women whose employers dissuaded them from claiming even the limited rights to which they are currently entitled under statute. That is the reality of irresponsible employers in Britain.
Despite all this, the Government continue to resist the case that we put forward in Committee and are urging tonight. We say that the burden of proof in cases like this should he on the employers. If an employer dismisses someone because that person is claiming her rights under maternity leave provisions, or because he, the employer, does not want to have the hassle of having such a woman on his work force, can anyone seriously suggest that he, with hand on heart, would state that that was the reason for dismissal? Of course not. The evidence that Conservative Members, as well as Opposition Members, have been receiving from citizens advice bureaux, the Equal Opportunities Commission and many other organisations indicates that, in respect of matters of this sort, employers do not always tell the truth.
Why is it regarded as unreasonable to put on the employer the onus to prove that he acted unreasonably in dismissing a woman employee? The Government are resisting such action, and, like my hon. Friends, I have been forced to the conclusion that the reason is that they did not want to have these rights in the first place. They resisted them in Europe. The hon. Member for Mid-Worcestershire (Mr. Forth), when he was at the Department of Employment, gave evidence suggesting that the Government did not want them, and in the final vote, the provisions having been watered down, they abstained.
On the front page of the last issue of The Independent on Sunday is a report to the effect that—surprise, surprise —employers are now discovering that their commitment to equal opportunity lasts only so long as they think that, from the labour market point of view, it is necessary to employ more women. As soon as they feel that unemployment is at such a level that the issue of equal opportunity and rights for women can be disposed of, the tendency will be for that commitment to disappear. That is why we need effective maternity rights and effective legislation against sex discrimination. It is also why we

need effective rights for working parents in general. This Bill's provisions on maternity rights represent an improvement, but that is testimony to the inadequacy of the current provisions rather than to a commitment to improvement.
I hope that the Government, even at this late stage, will take account of what was said during many hours in Committee. They have not argued effectively against the cases that have been put to them. I hope that they will at least agree to collect statistics so that it may be seen whether we are right and what effect this legislation will have. If the Government claim to have any regard at all for the rights of working parents, they should take on board the comments of hon. Members in favour of paternity leave and effective parental rights.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Patrick McLoughlin): Some Opposition Members have simply reiterated tonight the comments that they made in Committee. I was glad to hear the welcome that the hon. Member for Gateshead, East (Ms. Quin) gave to the many concessions that the Government have made following representations made to us. As she dealt with most of those concessions and basically welcomed them, I shall, at the appropriate time, simply move formally the provisions which apply them. That will probably be for the convenience of the House because, as the hon. Lady recognised, those concessions go a considerable way to meeting many of the concerns that were expressed.
Opposition Members should get their position clear on the EC directive. It is nonsense to suggest that the United Kingdom watered down that directive. The common position text agreed last December was produced by the Dutch presidency because it was clear that the Commission's original proposals were unacceptable to the great majority of member states. The treaty base for the directive provides for qualified majority voting, riot unanimity, and the United Kingdom was never in a position of being able to threaten to use a veto. No member state voted against the text of the directive agreed last year and the subsequent negotiations which led to the adoption of the directive on 19 October had not changed in any essential respect. Indeed, it was to the great credit of the Secretary of State that the matter was brought to a conclusion during the United Kingdom's presidency. So I cannot accept that in some way the United Kingdom was responsible for watering down the directive.

Ms. Quin: Is not it a fact that the British Government were the only Administration who wanted maternity pay to be allied with sick pay, and in that respect did water down the directive?

Mr. McLoughlin: I said in Committee that the Secretary of State for Social Security would be making a statement on maternity pay and, in so doing, would make the position of the Government clear.
The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) will persist in the fantasy that, somehow, the treatment of pregnant employees in the United Kingdom is inferior to such treatment in other EC member states. At 14 weeks, Britain has the longest period of maternity absence in Europe and, at 18 weeks, one of the longest periods of paid maternity absence. In addition, all pregnant employees in the United Kingdom have had the right to paid time off for antenatal care since 1980, a right which Spanish and


French women will enjoy as a result of the directive. I might have added that that will apply in socialist France and Spain—[Interruption.] It is for the French and Spanish people to reach their own decision on the matter.
I cannot accept new clauses 5 and 11. The purpose of the statutory maternity provisions is to safeguard the mother's career, while also giving her a period of time to prepare for, and recover from, childbirth and to nurse and care for her baby in its early life. The same considerations do not apply to paternity and parental leave. I do not consider that the measures proposed in either new clause are suitable for legislation.
Having listened to Opposition Members at Question Time continually asking us to ensure that we have the right conditions for employment growth, it is a bit rich of them to try to impose yet more burdens on employers, burdens that would lead to exactly the opposite of what they desire in terms of employment prospects in Britain.

Mr. Burden: rose—

Mr. McLoughlin: I will not give way because we must make progress and the hon. Gentleman spoke for a considerable time.
I recognise the concerns that new clause 10 and amendment No. 63 seek to address. It is important that we keep track of how new legislation is working in practice. I assure hon. Members that we shall keep the Bill under review, as we are anxious to do with any new legislation. But I see no justification for a statutory requirement to produce a report. It is clear that the real concerns of Opposition Members are less that we should publish an annual review of the working of the valuable new rights and more that we should greatly add to the costs of employers by increasing those rights in a wholly unacceptable way.
Opposition Members do not know a good deal when they see one. The Bill will ensure that every employee, no matter what her hours of work or how long she has been with her employer, will be entitled to take 14 weeks off work to have a baby. Currently anyone with under two years' service must look purely to the contract of employment for any rights at all to take time off work.
The changes are an important step forward and will go a long way to ensuring that rights for mothers and women expecting children are greatly enhanced. I commend the Government amendments to the House and hope that it will vote against the new clauses put forward by the Opposition.

Ms. Quin: We have had an interesting debate, although it has been staggering that no hon. Member on the Government Benches, apart from the Minister, has intervened on the important subject of maternity rights. I do not know whether that means that Government Back Benchers are not interested, or that they do not support the Government's view. Some of my hon. Friends correctly pointed out that the Government had been dragged kicking and screaming by the European Community to accept some of the limited and modest gains. Perhaps that is why none of the Minister's hon. Friends have supported him by speaking in the debate.

The Government have been isolated on many issues in the European Community. I agree with the points made by my hon. Friends about that.
I welcome the support of the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Carlile), the spokesman for the Liberal Democrats, on the issue and the additional arguments which he put forward.
The Minister stuck rigidly to his brief, as we came to expect in Committee. None the less, we hope that he will consider some of our arguments, particularly about some Government amendments which do not go far enough. At the very least, we hope that the Government will listen to representations from outside organisations.
Having said that, we do not wish to press new clause 5 to a vote, but when the time comes, we would like to vote on new clause 10. It is a modest amendment, calling for a report on the implementation and the working of the Bill. We are disappointed that the Government will not accept the new clause and it is important to vote on it.
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion, and clause, by leave withdrawn.

New clause 10

MATERNITY EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS REPORT

`(1) The Secretary of State shall publish a report to Parliament annually, to be called "The maternity employment rights report" on the effects of the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Act 1993.
(2) The Report shall assess the effects of the Act on:

(a) the employment opportunities for pregnant working women
(b) access to time off for ante-natal care (including relaxation classes and parentcraft classes)
(c) the operation of remuneration during 14 weeks maternity leave
(d) the number of women returning to work after the 14 weeks maternity leave
(e) the adequacy of 14 weeks maternity leave for the health of the mother and the baby.
(f) the operation and complexity of the scheme
(g) the number of women successfully claiming unfair dismissal because of pregnancy under this Act
(h) the number of women medically suspended for health and safety reasons each year

(3) Before publishing the Report, the Secretary of State shall consult such organisations as appear to him to be concerned.'.—[Ms. Quin.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Motion made, and Question put, That the clause be read a Second time:—

The House divided: Ayes 263, Noes 298.

Division No. 153]
[10.32 pm


AYES


Abbott, Ms Diane
Beith, Rt Hon A. J.


Adams, Mrs Irene
Benn, Rt Hon Tony


Ainger, Nick
Bennett, Andrew F.


Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)
Benton, Joe


Allen, Graham
Bermingham, Gerald


Alton, David
Berry, Dr. Roger


Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)
Betts, Clive


Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)
Blunkett, David


Armstrong, Hilary
Boateng, Paul


Ashton, Joe
Boyce, Jimmy


Austin-Walker, John
Boyes, Roland


Barnes, Harry
Bradley, Keith


Barron, Kevin
Bray, Dr Jeremy


Bayley, Hugh
Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)


Beckett, Margaret
Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)


Beggs, Roy
Burden, Richard






Byers, Stephen
Heppell, John


Caborn, Richard
Hill, Keith (Streatham)


Callaghan, Jim
Hinchliffe, David


Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)
Hoey, Kate


Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)
Hood, Jimmy


Campbell-Savours, D. N.
Howarth, George (Knowsley N)


Canavan, Dennis
Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)


Cann, Jamie
Hoyle, Doug


Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)
Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)


Chisholm, Malcolm
Hughes, Roy (Newport E)


Clapham, Michael
Hume, John


Clark, Dr David (South Shields)
Hutton, John


Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)
Ingram, Adam


Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)
Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)


Clelland, David
Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)


Clwyd, Mrs Ann
Jamieson, David


Coffey, Ann
Johnston, Sir Russell


Connarty, Michael
Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)


Cook, Robin (Livingston)
Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)


Corbett, Robin
Jones, Lynne (B'ham S 0)


Corbyn, Jeremy
Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)


Corston, Ms Jean
Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)


Cousins, Jim
Jowell, Tessa


Cox, Tom
Keen, Alan


Cryer, Bob
Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)


Cummings, John
Khabra, Piara S.


Cunliffe, Lawrence
Kilfoyle, Peter


Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)
Kirkwood, Archy


Cunningham, Dr John (C'p'l'nd)
Leighton, Ron


Dafis, Cynog
Lestor, Joan (Eccles)


Dalyell, Tam
Lewis, Terry


Darling, Alistair
Litherland, Robert


Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)
Livingstone, Ken


Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)
Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)


Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)
Llwyd, Elfyn


Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'I)
Loyden, Eddie


Denham, John
Lynne, Ms Liz


Dewar, Donald
McAllion, John


Dixon, Don
McAvoy, Thomas


Dobson, Frank
McCartney, Ian


Donohoe, Brian H.
Macdonald, Calum


Dowd, Jim
McFall, John


Dunnachie, Jimmy
McGrady, Eddie


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
McKelvey, William


Eagle, Ms Angela
Mackinlay, Andrew


Eastham, Ken
McLeish, Henry


Etherington, Bill
McMaster, Gordon


Evans, John (St Helens N)
McNamara, Kevin


Ewing, Mrs Margaret
Madden, Max


Field, Frank (Birkenhead)
Mahon, Alice


Fisher, Mark
Mallon, Seamus


Flynn, Paul
Marek, Dr John


Foster, Derek (B'p Auckland)
Marshall, David (Shettleston)


Foster, Don (Bath)
Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)


Foulkes, George
Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)


Fraser, John
Martlew, Eric


Fyfe, Maria
Maxton, John


Galbraith, Sam
Meacher, Michael


Galloway, George
Meale, Alan


Gapes, Mike
Michael, Alun


Garrett, John
Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)


Gerrard, Neil
Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll Bute)


Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Milburn, Alan


Godman, Dr Norman A.
Miller, Andrew


Godsiff, Roger
Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)


Golding, Mrs Llin
Molyneaux, Rt Hon James


Gordon, Mildred
Moonie, Dr Lewis


Gould, Bryan
Morgan, Rhodri


Graham, Thomas
Morley, Elliot


Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)
Morris, Rt Hon A. (Wy'nshawe)


Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)
Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)


Grocott, Bruce
Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)


Gunnell, John
Mowlam, Marjorie


Hain, Peter
Mudie, George


Hall, Mike
Mullin, Chris


Hanson, David
Murphy, Paul


Hardy, Peter
Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon


Harman, Ms Harriet
O'Brien, Michael (N W'kshire)


Harvey, Nick
O'Brien, William (Normanton)


Henderson, Doug
O'Hara, Edward





Olner, William
Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)


O'Neill. Martin
Snape, Peter


Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Soley, Clive


Paisley, Rev Ian
Spearing, Nigel


Parry, Robert
Spellar, John


Pendry, Tom
Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)


Pickthall, Colin
Steinberg, Gerry


Pike, Peter L.
Stevenson, George


Pope, Greg
Stott, Roger


Powell, Ray (Ogmore)
Strang, Dr. Gavin


Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)
Straw, Jack


Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)
Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)


Primarolo, Dawn
Taylor, Rt Hon John D. (Strgtd)


Purchase, Ken
Tipping, Paddy


Quin, Ms Joyce
Trimble, David


Radice, Giles
Turner, Dennis


Randall, Stuart
Tyler, Paul


Raynsford, Nick
Wallace, James


Redmond, Martin
Walley, Joan


Reid, Dr John
Wardell, Gareth (Gower)


Robertson, George (Hamilton)
Wareing, Robert N


Roche, Mrs. Barbara
Watson, Mike


Rogers, Allan
Welsh, Andrew


Rooker, Jeff
Wicks, Malcolm


Rooney, Terry
Wigley, Dafydd


Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)
Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)


Ross, William (E Londonderry)
Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)


Rowlands, Ted
Wilson, Brian


Ruddock, Joan
Winnick, David


Salmond, Alex
Wise, Audrey


Sheerman, Barry
Worthington, Tony


Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Wray, Jimmy


Shore, Rt Hon Peter
Wright, Dr Tony


Short, Clare



Simpson, Alan
Tellers for the Ayes:


Skinner, Dennis
Mr. Jack Thompson and


Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)
Mr. Jon Owen Jones.


Smith, C. (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)



NOES


Adley, Robert
Browning, Mrs. Angela


Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)
Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)


Aitken, Jonathan
Budgen, Nicholas


Alexander, Richard
Burns, Simon


Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)
Burt, Alistair


Allason, Rupert (Torbay)
Butler, Peter


Amess, David
Butterfill, John


Ancram, Michael
Carlisle, John (Luton North)


Arbuthnot, James
Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)


Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)
Carrington, Matthew


Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)
Carttiss, Michael


Ashby, David
Cash, William


Aspinwall, Jack
Channon, Rt Hon Paul


Atkins, Robert
Chapman, Sydney


Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)
Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)


Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)
Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ruclif)


Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)
Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey


Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)
Coe, Sebastian


Baldry, Tony
Congdon, David


Banks, Matthew (Southport)
Conway, Derek


Banks, Robert (Harrogate)
Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)


Bates, Michael
Coombs, Simon (Swindon)


Batiste, Spencer
Cope, Rt Hon Sir John


Bellingham, Henry
Couchman, James


Bendall, Vivian
Cran, James


Beresford, Sir Paul
Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)


Biffen, Rt Hon John
Day, Stephen


Blackburn, Dr John G.
Deva, Nirj Joseph


Body, Sir Richard
Devlin, Tim


Booth, Hartley
Dickens, Geoffrey


Boswell, Tim
Dicks, Terry


Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)
Dorrell, Stephen


Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James


Bowden, Andrew
Dover, Den


Bowis, John
Duncan, Alan


Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes
Duncan-Smith, Iain


Brazier, Julian
Dunn, Bob


Bright, Graham
Durant, Sir Anthony


Brooke, Rt Hon Peter
Dykes, Hugh


Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)
Eggar, Tim






Elletson, Harold
Lang, Rt Hon Ian


Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)
Lawrence, Sir Ivan


Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)
Legg, Barry


Evans, Roger (Monmouth)
Lennox-Boyd, Mark


Evennett, David
Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)


Faber, David
Lidington, David


Fabricant, Michael
Lightbown, David


Fenner, Dame Peggy
Lilley, Rt Hon Peter


Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)
Lloyd, Peter (Fareham)


Fishburn, Dudley
Lord, Michael


Forman, Nigel
Luff, Peter


Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)
Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas


Forth, Eric
MacKay, Andrew


Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)
Maclean, David


Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)
McLoughlin, Patrick


Freeman, Roger
McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick


French, Douglas
Madel, David


Fry, Peter
Maitland, Lady Olga


Gale, Roger
Major, Rt Hon John


Gallie, Phil
Malone, Gerald


Gardiner, Sir George
Mans, Keith


Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan
Marland, Paul


Garnier, Edward
Marlow, Tony


Gill, Christopher
Marshall, John (Hendon S)


Gillan, Cheryl
Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)


Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair
Martin, David (Portsmouth S)


Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles
Mawhinney, Dr Brian


Gorman, Mrs Teresa
Merchant, Piers


Gorst, John
Milligan, Stephen


Grant, Sir Anthony (Cambs SW)
Mills, Iain


Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)
Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)


Greenway, John (Ryedale)
Mitchell, Sir David (Hants NW)


Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)
Moate, Sir Roger


Grylls, Sir Michael
Monro, Sir Hector


Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn
Montgomery, Sir Fergus


Hague, William
Moss, Malcolm


Hamilton, Rt Hon Archie (Epsom)
Needham, Richard


Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)
Nelson, Anthony


Hampson, Dr Keith
Neubert, Sir Michael


Hanley, Jeremy
Newton, Rt Hon Tony


Hannam, Sir John
Nicholls, Patrick


Hargreaves, Andrew
Nicholson, David (Taunton)


Harris, David
Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)


Haselhurst, Alan
Norris, Steve


Hawkins, Nick
Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley


Hawksley, Warren
Oppenheim, Phillip


Hayes, Jerry
Ottaway, Richard


Heald, Oliver
Page, Richard


Heathcoat-Amory, David
Paice, James


Hendry, Charles
Patnick, Irvine


Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael
Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey


Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.
Pawsey, James


Hill, James (Southampton Test)
Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth


Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)
Pickles, Eric


Horam, John
Porter, Barry (Wirral S)


Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter
Porter, David (Waveney)


Howard, Rt Hon Michael
Portillo, Rt Hon Michael


Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)
Powell, William (Corby)


Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)
Redwood, John


Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)
Renton, Rt Hon Tim


Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)
Richards, Rod


Hunter, Andrew
Riddick, Graham


Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas
Rifkind, Rt Hon. Malcolm


Jack, Michael
Robathan, Andrew


Jackson, Robert (Wantage)
Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn


Jenkin, Bernard
Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)


Jessel, Toby
Robinson, Mark (Somerton)


Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey
Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)


Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)
Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela


Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)
Ryder, Rt Hon Richard


Jopling, Rt Hon Michael
Sackville, Tom


Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine
Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim


Key, Robert
Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas


Kilfedder, Sir James
Shaw, David (Dover)


Knapman, Roger
Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)


Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)
Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian


Knight, Greg (Derby N)
Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)


Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)
Shersby, Michael


Kynoch, George (Kincardine)
Sims, Roger


Lait, Mrs Jacqui
Skeet, Sir Trevor





Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)
Tracey, Richard


Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)
Tredinnick, David


Soames, Nicholas
Trend, Michael


Speed. Sir Keith
Twinn, Dr Ian


Spencer, Sir Derek
Vaughan, Sir Gerard


Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)
Waldegrave, Rt Hon William


Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)
Walden, George


Spink, Dr Robert
Walker, Bill (N Tayside)


Spring, Richard
Waller, Gary


Sproat, Iain
Ward, John


Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)
Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)


Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John
Waterson, Nigel


Steen, Anthony
Watts, John


Stephen, Michael
Wells, Bowen


Stewart, Allan
Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John


Streeter, Gary
Whitney, Ray


Sumberg, David
Whittingdale, John


Sweeney, Walter
Widdecombe, Ann


Sykes, John
Wiggin, Sir Jerry


Tapsell, Sir Peter
Willetts, David


Taylor, Ian (Esher)
Wilshire, David


Taylor, John M. (Solihull)
Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)


Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)
Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)


Temple-Morris, Peter
Wolfson, Mark


Thomason, Roy
Wood, Timothy


Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)
Yeo, Tim


Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)
Young, Sir George (Acton)


Thornton, Sir Malcolm



Thurnham, Peter
Tellers for the Noes:


Townend, John (Bridlington)
Mr. Timothy Kirkhope and


Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)
Mr. Robert G. Hughes.

Question accordingly negatived

Clause 1

ELECTION SCRUTINEER TO CHECK REGISTER

Amendment made: No. 56, in page 2, line 28, at end insert—
'(3C) The duty of confidentiality as respects the register is incorporated in the scrutineer's appointment.'—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Clause 2

COUNTING OF ELECTION VOTES ETC. BY INDEPENDENT PERSON

Amendment made: No. 57, in page 3, line 42, at end insert—
'()The duty of confidentiality as respects the register is incorporated in an appointment under this section.'—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Clause 4

BALLOTS FOR UNION AMALGAMATION AND TRANSFERS OF ENGAGEMENTS

Amendments made: No. 58, in page 6, line 29, at end insert—
'() The duty of confidentiality as respects the register is incorporated in the scrutineer's appointment.'.

No. 9 in page 8, line 8, at end insert—
'(4A) No voting paper which is sent to a person for voting shall have enclosed with any other document except

(a) the notice which, under section 99(1) is to accompany the voting paper,
(b) an addressed envelope, and
(c) a document containing instructions for the return of the voting paper, without any other statement.'

No. 59, in page 8, line 37, at end insert—
`() The duty of confidentiality as respects the register is incorporated in an appointment under this section.'—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Clause 6

STATEMENT TO MEMBERS FOLLOWING ANNUAL RETURN

Mr. McLoughlin: I beg to move amendment No. 12, in page 11, line 25, leave out from 'Officer' to end of line 27 and insert
'all the members of the union are provided with the statement required by this section by any of the methods allowed by subsection (1A).

(1A) Those methods are—

(a) the sending of individual copies of the statement to members; or
(b) any other means (whether by including the statement in a publication of the union or otherwise) which it is the practice of the union to use when information of general interest to all its members needs to be provided to them.'

Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): With this we may take the following: Amendment No. 65, in page 11, line 37, leave out
'and other benefits provided to'.
Government amendment No. 13.

Mr. McLoughlin: Amendments Nos. 12 and 13 respond to concerns expressed in Committee on 3 December. They fulfil the Government's commitment to table amendments that would address the issues raised in amendments Nos. 9 and 10.

Mr. Galbraith: The Minister is right in saying that Government amendment No. 12 fulfils obligations made in Committee to deal with the means by which members can be notified about accounts. Amendment No. 65 was tabled by the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), who will wish to speak to it. We have already discussed the issues in Committee, and we support the aim of the amendment, for reasons that the hon. Gentleman will no doubt want to raise again later.
As for Government amendment No. 13, will the Minister explain why the copies of the statement should be provided free of charge if a copy has already been provided, either directly or through publication? Why should a member be able to request a copy without at least paying for delivery?

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I tabled amendment No. 65 because I fear that the Government's definition of "other benefits" may be too broad. I should be interested to know whether there is a greater requirement to add up all the small benefits that trade unions might have in theory, compared with the requirement for company directors to have their package put together.
If we are talking just about pay and pensions, that seems fine; if the provision goes wider than that, I feel that we should be given an explanation why we are picking out trade union leaders and assuming that they are far more likely to go off with the family silver than a director of a public company.

Mr. McLoughlin: Let me deal first with the point raised by the hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Galbraith). His point was that we originally said that copies had to be provided directly to all members. We have now accepted the points made by the Opposition in Committee, but we have said that, if someone wants a more specified account, that person will have a right to it

free of charge. I think that our amendments go some way towards meeting the concerns expressed by Opposition Members.
As for amendment No. 65, I have already said that the Government welcome the fact that, on Second Reading, the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) expressed support for the new rules. We consider them important. There would be little point in setting up arrangements meaning that, for example, a union could legitimately avoid having to tell its members the value or nature of the personal benefits received by its leader; yet that is exactly what the amendment would do.
I should make clear the nature of the information that will have to be given—as, indeed, was made clear in Committee on 1 December, during debate on amendment No. 20. In order to satisfy the new duty, a union must do its best to give details of all salary payments expressed in cash amounts and all other benefits that could either be expressed in terms of cash equivalent figures or in terms of an adequate description of the benefits concerned, if that is more appropriate or practical. The Government are grateful for the way in which the Opposition addressed these particular points. The principles, while providing the unions with more flexibility and options in respect of the discharge of their new duties, are acceptable to the House.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I do not intend to press the amendment to a Division, but if Bill Morris, the general secretary of my trade union, the Transport and General Workers Union, is provided with a flat—I do not know whether he is or not—would that be counted? If, for example, the chief operating officer of ICI is provided with a flat, would that be counted in the company's report and accounts? If there is a difference in treatment, why?

Mr McLoughlin: My hon. Friend needs to look only at the way that this issue was dealt with in Committee. If a benefit to a person is a benefit over and above what is regarded as for his official duties, it should be shown.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made: No. 13, in page 12, line 51, at end insert—
'() If at any time during the period of two years beginning with the day referred to in subsection (1) any member of the trade union requests a copy of the statement required by this section, the union shall, as soon as practicable, furnish him with such a copy free of charge.'—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Clause 8

OFFENCES

Mr. McLoughlin: I beg to move amendment No. 14, in page 19, line 6, leave out '(1)'.
As hon. Members know, clause 8 makes further provisions relating to offences by amending, and adding to, section 45 of the 1992 Act. This amendment modifies provisions in new section 45A(2).
New section 45A(2) deals with prosecution time limits for offences under section 45(1) relating to the duty imposed by section 32(1). This duty requires trade unions to send the certification officer an annual return relating to its financial affairs. As they appear in the Bill, the provisions allow proceedings for an offence relating to the duty to be commenced within three years of the date when the offence was committed.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 10

RIGHT NOT TO BE EXCLUDED OR EXPELLED

Mr. Michael Forsyth: I beg to move amendment No. 15, in page 22, line 17, leave out 'or'.

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to take Government amendment No. 16.

Mr. Forsyth: These amendments were introduced in response to a valuable suggestion made by my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) and were

welcomed on both sides of the Committee when we debated this clause. Essentially, the amendments ensure that it is not possible to exclude someone from membership of a trade union because of his or her membership of a political party. This was welcomed on both sides of the Committee. I commend the amendment to the House.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made: No. 16, in page 22, line 19, at end insert—
`(iii) a member of a political party, or'.—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 11

RIGHT NOT TO SUFFER DEDUCTION OF UNAUTHORISED OR EXCESSIVE SUBSCRIPTIONS

Mr. Michael Forsyth: I beg to move amendment No. 17, in page 25, line 8, leave out 'remains in force' and insert 'is current'.

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to consider the following amendments: Government amendments Nos. 18 and 19.
No. 67, in page 25, line 13, leave out 'three' and insert `seven'.
No. 83, in page 25, line 13, leave out 'three' and insert 'ten'.
Government amendment No. 20.

Mr. Forsyth: Government amendments Nos. 17 to 20, like many others for consideration today, have been introduced as the result of the constructive discussion of the Bill's provisions that took place in Standing Committee F.
When what is now clause 11 was debated in that Committee, the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) stated that it would be helpful if we adopted what he termed the "big bang" approach to the renewal of consent to check-off deductions from salary—that is, that employers should be able to seek renewed consent from all their work force at once.
It is an essential point of principle underpinning this clause that individuals who pay their union dues through the check-off should have the opportunity periodically to reconsider their consent and renew it, if they so wish. It is no part of this policy, however, that unnecessary administrative burdens should be incurred by employers. Let us remember that we are not imposing any unavoidable duty on employers; employers are free to decide for themselves whether they wish to enter into an agreement with a trade union to operate check-off arrangements.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: Is it open to an employer, as a consenting organisation, to come to an agreement with a trade union and employees that they do not have to renew the arrangements every three years or after any other specified period? Is there any reason why it should not be left to employers, trade unions and employees?

Mr. Forsyth: My hon. Friend will recognise that it is extremely important that, if deductions are being made from individuals' pay packets, consent is obtained on a regular basis. When my hon. Friend invites me to speculate about the type of agreement, it sounds like a remarkably collectivist approach. Perhaps he will explain what he means.

Mr. Bottomley: I know that one of my difficulties is that of communicating clearly. Is there any reason why an employer and his employee should not make an agreement that the consent will run for more than three years? Why should the House say that, whatever the two of them may want to agree, they are not allowed to?

Mr. Forsyth: My hon. Friend needs to recognise the fact that the agreement is between not the employer and the employee but the employer and the trade union. The employer agrees to take money out of the employee's pay packet and give it to the trade union. During and prier to

the general election campaign, the Government made it clear that it was their policy that there should be a requirement to obtain individual consent from an employee on a regular basis before money was deducted.

Mr. Bill Olner: Does not the Minister realise that any check-off agreement is an agreement between the employer, the employee and the trade union? Three groups make the agreement possible. For the life of me, I cannot see why renewal has to be applied for after a specified number of years, as the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) said.
When we paid rates, I signed a direct debit to have my rates stopped from my account. That direct debit did not end when I unfortunately had to pay my poll tax and it will continue when I pay my council tax this year. I cannot understand why there has to be so much interference and over-regulation, with the Government insisting that an agreement must be renewed every three years.

Mr. Forsyth: I am delighted to hear of the direct debit arrangement that the hon. Gentleman made for his poll tax as he calls it. There is nothing to stop such an agreement being made by an employee and a trade union. An employee could perfectly well pay his subscriptions by direct debit, which would not be affected by this or any other legislation.
What is at issue is the situation in which the trade union tells an employer that it would like him to deduct union subscriptions from an individual employee's—

Mr. Miller: Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Forsyth: When I have answered the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Olner).
When a union has agreed with an employer that the employer will deduct subscriptions from the employee's wages before they are paid to the employee, there should be a requirement for written consent to be given by the employee and that it should be renewed. I know that the hon. Gentleman understands that because the amendment has been tabled in response to representations made by his colleague for renewal of consent to be obtained within a three-year period.

Mr. Miller: What if the agreement is specifically between the employee and the employer, and the employee fills in a form saying, "Please deduct the following sums of money and pass them to my trade union"? The trade union is not involved. In that case, there is no three-way discussion as in the circumstances described by my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Olner), because the employee freely passes the form on to a third party for it to be collected like a direct debit. Those circumstances are distinct from those that the Minister tried to portray, in which a monolithic trade union tells the employer to make large deductions from the employee's pay packet and pass them to it. Is the Minister prepared to accept that, if an employee freely enters into an agreement, that agreement can last for the length of time that the employee or employer is prepared to live with it?

Mr. Forsyth: No. The hon. Gentleman obviously thinks that, as it is late, he can get me into a muddle so that I agree to what he would like to happen. The hon. Gentleman would like dues to be deducted from the employees' pay packet without their express consent on a regular basis—

Mr. Miller: I did not say that.

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. If the hon. Gentleman wishes to intervene again, he is at liberty to do so, but not from a sedentary position.

11 pm

Mr. Forsyth: The provisions in the Bill are clear and they are perfectly reasonable and responsible. They are that if a trade union wishes an employer to deduct subs from an employee's pay packet, consent is required initially, and that consent needs to be renewed on a three-year basis.
The second part of the hon. Gentleman's question related to an arrangement between the trade union and the employee. If a trade union arranges with employees to pay direct by direct debit subscriptions, none of these provisions applies. I should have thought that that was perfectly clear and simple and perfectly acceptable to any right-thinking person.

Mr. Winnick: I am grateful to the Minister, who has given way a number of times. Why does not he admit that there has been no pressure from employers for this change and that the real explanation is simply the Government's spite? Moreover, if the Minister, his colleagues and supporters are really concerned about finance, would it not be worthwhile for them to publish the accounts of their own party? Secretive methods are used to finance the Conservative party, and its accounts are not published in the same way as those of other political parties. That is the problem that should be addressed, and as soon as possible.

Mr. Forsyth: I know that the hon. Gentleman has not followed our proceedings particularly carefully, but this has nothing to do with the political levy. The hon. Gentleman must not tempt me to consider the political levy and those matters which, so far, in the process of considering the Bill, we have avoided. This is about the payment of subscriptions using the check-off system.
As to the point that the hon. Gentleman asked me to confirm, that not a single employer had made representations, no, that is not the case.

Mr. Winnick: I said that there had been no pressure from employers.

Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Gentleman said that there had been no pressure from employers or employers' organisations for this change. Had the hon. Gentleman followed the proceedings, he would know that we have made a change. Instead of requiring annual renewal of consent, it will be required every three years, as a result of representations from the Institute of Personnel Management.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: My hon. Friend said that some employers had asked for this. My understanding is that the Institute of Personnel Management employs a small number of people in Wimbledon. When I asked
which employers' associations or employers have asked for trades unions to be required to review members' written authorisations to deduction at source of union subscriptions every three years",
my hon. Friend's answer was:
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has received no such representations."—[Official Report, 2 February 1993; Vol. 218, c. 160–61.]

Mr. Forsyth: I am rather puzzled by my hon. Friend's description of the Institute of Personnel Management, which has something of a reputation in this area. I said that it made representations for the change that is incorporated in the Bill which requires consent on a three-year basis. It is perfectly reasonable for the Government to respond to representations from such a body. The CBI and others originally pressed for an extension of the time scale to every five years. I now understand that the CBI and the Institute of Personnel Management accept that three years is a reasonable compromise, which I should have thought would have been acceptable to my hon. Friend.

Mr. Bottomley: As a Fellow of the Institute of Personnel Management, may I say that what my hon. Friend is saying does not reflect the general view of those at the top of the profession. It may be that he has better and further particulars, but in another answer he said that the proposal was made to him in the first place in the response of the Institute of Personnel Management to the Green Paper. I suspect that if he dug rather more deeply he would find that the IPM may have said it, but that there is no weight of support for the measure within that organisation. I suspect that the CBI would much prefer seven or 10 years, and that most employers do not want the provision at all.

Mr. Forsyth: It is a basic principle, on which we fought the general election, that trade union subs should not be deducted without the consent of members, and the Green Paper set out our plans, which were originally for annual consent. I find it slightly odd that my hon. Friend appears to be criticising the Government for responding to representations from the Institute of Personnel Management which has made the Bill closer to the position that he evidently supports.

Mr. Dobson: Having confirmed that no employers asked for check-off to be fouled up, can the Minister confirm that the Government have received representations from employers asking them to leave things alone?

Mr. Forsyth: We have been round this course so many times. Perhaps I could remind the hon. Gentleman of the support which that splendid organisation the Institute of Directors has given in respect of this. Perhaps I could read a brief extract from the evidence that it provided. I am not sure how many people it employs, but it represents a number of businesses and business interests. The evidence reads:
The collection of trade union subscriptions by employers through the check-off system represents a substantial subsidy to trade unions by employers. The 1989 dispute in the engineering industry where a strike levy had to be deducted through the check-off system by the very employers who were targeted in the dispute supports the IOD's contention that the process cannot be justified.
The institute cannot be clearer than that.
My hon. Friend quoted from a parliamentary answer that I gave him. The question that he asked was
which employers' associations or employers have asked for trades unions to be required to review members' written authorisations to deduction at source of union subscriptions every three years."—[Official Report, 2 February 1993; Vol. 218, c. 160 –61.]
I said that we had received no such written representations and pointed out that, under the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill, it was employers who were 


required to seek renewed consent to check-off deductions from their employees every three years, and not the unions, as his question implied.

Mr. Dobson: Setting aside employers' organisations, which I did not mention, will the Minister confirm that the Government have received no representation in favour of this overall policy from any employer, and that the Government have received several representations from employers against what they are proposing?

Mr. Forsyth: Labour hon. Members may do what trade unions tell them, but, on this side, we do not necessarily do what employers tell us. The process by which we have brought about the reforms which have produced a transformation in industrial relations in this country has been a step-by-step approach which has been based on enhancing the rights of individual trade union members. If the hon. Member is seriously arguing that it is wrong to give individual trade union members the right to consent to deductions being made from their pay packets on a regular basis, and that I need to justify that by pointing to employer interest, then I have to say that earlier this evening the hon. Member was arguing that we were doing everything because we were responding to the Nested interests of employers. Now he is criticising me because he cannot demonstrate that we are doing this in response to representations from employers—[Interruption.] The consistency which the hon. Member seeks is the consistency of standing up—

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. We cannot have a private conversation. [Interruption.] Well, not with me.

Mr. Forsyth: I am sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was tempted into straying into a debate with the hon. Member. The point that I was wishing to make is that the golden thread, the consistency of our policy, is standing up for trade union rights of individual trade union members instead of speaking for trade union leaders and barons on whom the Labour party is so heavily dependent, and controls.

Mr. Dobson: Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that it is, under existing law, a criminal offence for an employer to deduct any sum of money from an employee's pay packet without his or her previous consent?

Mr. Forsyth: Indeed, I can confirm that. But the hon. Gentleman did not go on to point out that, if employees are bound by a collective agreement, that can be taken as individual consent. [Interruption.] We have had this debate on Second Reading and in Committee, and members of the TUC and others have acknowledged the position. We are making it absolutely clear that individual consent will be required on a regular basis.
What is it that the Labour party is so afraid of—or perhaps not just the Labour party—when individuals have to give their express consent before money is paid—

Mr. Peter Bottomley: rose—

Mr. Forsyth: Very well, I give way.

Mr. Bottomley: The Government are in a weak position; they ought to try to sort out their arguments. In an answer, my hon. Friend said to me that there was no reason why clause 11 should entail any extra work for employers. Just now he said to me that he thought that his answer previously related to the fact that trade unions did

not have to provide this renewed consent. If it is the employers who have to do it, how can he say that there is no reason why this measure should entail any extra work for employers?

Mr. Forsyth: Because, as my hon. Friend will be aware, there is nothing in the legislation which requires employers to operate check-off. If they decide to operate check-off, they do so on a voluntary basis; it is an agreement between them and the trade unions. There is no statutory requirement to do so. All we are saying is that, if the employers and the trade unions decide to reach such an arrangement, there should be a proper framework to protect the rights of the individual trade union member. Indeed, it is open to employers, if they wish to operate check-off, to make a charge to the trade unions to cover this.

Mr. Winnick: rose—

Mr. Forsyth: Well, it is getting late and we have been round the course several times. I have given way a number of times, but I will give way once more to the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Winnick: If there is any ambiguity whatsoever—and my hon. Friends and I tend to disagree that there is —the present legal position is that an employee has to sign a statement that he is willing for the deduction to be made. The Minister says that that is not necessarily so, if I understand him. Will he therefore accept that we would have no opposition whatsoever to making the law absolutely clear that, whatever may be the collective agreement, the individual concerned should and must give his agreement? There would be no opposition from me, and I cannot imagine there would be from any of my hon. Friends. But, once having given his agreement in writing, there is no reason, except spite, why that should have to be renewed every three of four years. Why not accept that this is an agreement that has been given by the employee, and, unless he or she wants to change it, there is no reason why the law should interfere?

Mr. Forsyth: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for at least acknowledging that individual consent should be required, and I look forward to his support. But what a damning indictment of the trade union movement that the hon. Gentleman feels threatened in some way by the fact that individual consent is required to be renewed on a regular basis. The hon. Gentleman sounds like an inertia salesman arguing that, because he signed the form once, it will be held that he will always wish to be a member of the trade union. What the hon. Gentleman calls spite I would call ensuring that the individual is aware of the amounts being paid and is given the opportunity to renew his consent.
I am glad to commend these Government amendments to the House.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I am not sure whether my hon. Friend has been a member of a trade union, an employer —although I may be wrong about that—or that he is qualified in personnel management. I have had experience of all three. I do not profess to know it all and I may occasionally make mistakes. However, if I signed up for give as you earn, I would not expect the Government to 


say that I had to renew my consent to that, although the money that I would be giving away was likely to be more than my union subscription.
I suspect that the reason for the provision was a strike levy and some employers found that they were making deductions to run a strike against themselves. If the Government want to tackle that issue, it should be targeted. The Government have found it perfectly possible in this Bill and in others to target particular issues which upset one of the consenting parties, although it is open to an employer to decide not to continue with the check-off deductions from wages.
I suspect that we have been carried away. I also suspect that there has been some confusion and that, when I check with the Institute of Personnel Management, I will find that it suggested renewal every three years rather than annually. That was not the answer which I understood from my hon. Friend, but that was probably my mistake.
11.15 pm
I thought that when I asked my hon. Friend who suggested it, he replied that the Institute of Personnel Management had suggested renewed consent, but I am sure that that was my mistake.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is the position. I assumed that my hon. Friend would be aware of the commitments that we made before the general election and during the election campaign.

Mr. Bottomley: I spend my time supporting some and saying that I do not support others. One reason for getting elected to the House is not just to be a nodding toy in favour of whatever the Government propose. It strikes me as a good idea to bring forward one's own ideas and commitments, especially if they are long term and consistent. Without straying too far from the terms of the order, that is what I did in regard to child benefit, to get the Government to adopt their old policy rather than sticking to their medium-term policy.
When I asked my right hon. Friend
what assessment she has made of the extra work required by employers as a result of clause 11 of the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill",
my hon. Friend replied:
Clause 11 of the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill gives individuals a greater right to belong to the union of their choice.
That is not quite right unless the order of the clauses has changed, because clause 11 deals with the right not to suffer deductions of unauthorised or excessive subscriptions and I do not see how that clause deals with greater rights for individuals to belong to the union of their choice. The second sentence of my hon. Friend's reply stated:
There is no reason why this measure should entail any extra work for employers."—[Official Report, 1 February 1993; Vol. 218, c. 60.]
I may have asked the wrong question when I asked
which employers' associations or employers have asked for trades' unions to be required to review members' written authorisation to deduction at source of union subscriptions every three years.
My hon. Friend replied that our right hon. Friend
the Secretary of State has received no such representations. Under proposals in the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill it is employers who will be required

to seek renewed consent to check-off deductions from their employees every three years."—[Official Report, 2 February 1993; Vol. 218, c. 160–161.]
Those two replies are inconsistent; they cannot both be right. Either the trade union or the employer has to do the work. In practice, I suspect that both will have to do the work.
When I was a member of the Government I used to attend a committee trying to reduce the burden on business. If the committee had come across issues involving employers having to go out 4 million or 6 million times—whatever the figure may be—every three years, my noble Friend Lord Young would have said that it should stop and that we should carry out a survey of 100 employers, 10 employers or even ask the next person in the bus queue, "Are you an employer? Do you want every three years to get a renewed consent to a deduction when an employee has voluntarily asked an employer to deduct his union subscription?" The proposal would not have lasted a moment.
I suggest that, whatever the result tonight, the Government take away their proposal and, before the Bill reaches another place, they should ask employers about it. I have done a survey, but I have not asked the employers for their consent to give their views. Every employer that I asked—the major ones feel more strongly than the small ones as they deal with larger numbers—does not want it. If they must have it, they do not want three years: they want five years, seven years or 10 years.
I have approached some issues in the Bill from the point of view of trade union members or low-paid employees. I have approached this issue from the point of view of employers. Employers agree that it is necessary to get written consent from employees who are trade union members, but they do not want to do any more.
I shall make two suggestions to the Minister. First, the provision must be modified in such a way that, if there is to be a variable sum not linked simply to how much people earn but possibly annual, semi-annual or biannual changes to union subscriptions, it can be let through without renewed consent as long as the employee, the member, is told what the new sum will be. That is much the same way in which I pay my electricity, gas and telephone bills. Information about any change in the figure is worth while. That is the smallest requirement which is needed.
Secondly, the Government should start treating those who vote for trade union leaders through secret or postal ballots as grown-ups and people who make up their own mind as to whether they want to stop or continue being a member of a trade union or whether they want to change the way in which they pay their subscription. It strikes me as common sense, fair and reasonable.

Mr. Galbraith: It is difficult for me to say much more, following the speech of the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley). As the Minister said, we have been round the issue many times. Although we have come back to it, the Minister is still in as much of a muddle as he was in Committee. His position is still as rocky and difficult as ever. He has failed to provide any justification whatever for the check-off arrangement and its renewal.
Let us be clear what the Conservative party manifesto said.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: I am puzzled that the hon. Gentleman has made that point because my heart leapt for joy when I saw amendment No. 83, in which the Labour


party seems to accept the principle that there should be renewed consent. Although the Government's proposal is for consent every three years and the proposal of the hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Galbraith) is for consent every 10 years, the Opposition, by tabling the amendment, have accepted the principle of renewed consent.

Mr. Galbraith: I never thought the Minister was quite so silly, but he is certainly demonstrating his ability tonight. We tabled the amendment because sometimes we accept the lesser of two evils and try to ameliorate what is inevitable from the Government. In Committee, we made it clear that we oppose the repeated renewal of the check-off arrangement and that has been the basis of our argument against it. The Minister should not be so silly, making such a cheap political point which will not find him favour with anyone.
The Minister, by sleight of hand, tried to imply to Conservative Members that there was something in the Conservative election manifesto which imposed a time limit on the regular renewal of union subscriptions. The manifesto says:
We will make automatic deduction of union membership dues without written authorisation unlawful.
It says nothing whatever about a time scale. Conservative Members should be clear on that matter.
Sometimes I wonder why that statement is in the manifesto because, on our understanding of the law, it is unlawful to take money from people's salaries without their express written consent. There is no need to change the law. The election manifesto commitment has been fulfilled and therefore the clause is unnecessary.
The Labour party is not opposed to members being notified of any increases in their union subscriptions. We do not object to employers notifying members that they can withdraw from the arrangement at any time. The present position is that subscriptions cannot be deducted without the member's express written permission and changes to the law are not necessary. We object to the time scale, especially the three-yearly renewal that is required. It is bureaucratic and unnecessary and it places burdens on both employers and trade unions.
We asked the Minister again to tell us who supported the idea. Again, he had trouble. He brought in the Institute of Directors, the provisional wing of the Tory party. We would expect it to support almost anything. But he found it difficult to find anyone else who has pressed for the restriction. Some employers' organisations realised that they would face a yearly renewal and therefore decided to go for something less damaging. We are willing to accept five or three years.
Let us hear some of the words of some of the employers' organisations in response to the suggestion that there should be annual renewal. The Engineering Employers Federation said that it was
an unnecessary administrative nightmare without any commensurate benefits.
The British Institute of Management echoed that and said:
It will lead to administrative burdens on employers.
The Institute of Personnel Management, whom the Minister tried to call in to support his case, said:
There has been no groundswell of support from our members for a change in the check-off arrangements.
The Association of British Chambers of Commerce, that well-known left-wing organisation, said:
Many Chambers have difficulty in seeing what advantage this proposal has for the employers.

So there is no groundswell of support for the measure, even from the employers' organisations.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I have asked another parliamentary question on the matter. I asked the Secretary of State
a"if employers are presently prohibited from checking at any time and at any interval whether any employee maintains consent previously given for deductions of union subscriptions.
My hon. Friend the Minister confirmed that employers could do roughly what they liked. But he went on to say—the hon. Gentleman might like to test the Minister on this—
Existing law on the operation of the 'check-off' offers little protection to employees who pay their union subscriptions through the check-off."—[0fficial Report, 9 February 1993; Vol. 218, c. 590.]
Presumably they have all consented to pay. What can he possibly have meant?

Mr. Galbraith: There is no need for me to ask the Minister the question again. He might like to answer it in his reply.
The question remains why trade unions have been taken out and given special consideration in the matter of having to renew an agreement for a financial deduction. Never mind that we are not required to make annual, three-yearly or even 10-yearly renewal of the direct debit arrangements which all of us have for paying electricity bills and gas bills and some of us even for paying Access bills—although not necessarily everyone. Other deductions are made from employees' wages which do not require annual, three-yearly or even 10-yearly renewal. Such deductions include payments to charities. It is not necessary for them to be renewed every three years. Why are they different? They also include deductions for sports club subscriptions. Why do not they have to be renewed every year?
Why is it that the trade unions have been singled out? What is the basis of the measure? Is some abuse of the system taking place? If so, let the Minister tell us what it is and why he is not taking corrective action. In our view, if there is abuse, those involved in it are breaking the law and it is up to the Government to ensure that the law is enforced. If that is not the case and he cannot give us the details of any abuse, why does he persist with the measure?
Is the reason that suggested by the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) and that which the Minister slightly suggested again tonight? The employers are under no obligation to operate check-off. Therefore, the Government hope that if they make it bureaucratically difficult, employers will stop operating it and so damage the trade unions. Of course, that is just a cynical view not held widely among Opposition Members. We think it is a piece of utter stupidity introduced by the Minister with no justification whatever. That is the reason why we shall ask the House to support amendment No. 83 in the Lobby tonight.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. May we be sure which amendment we are voting on?

Madam Deputy Speaker: A decision has just been taken on Government amendment No. 17.

Amendments made: No. 18, in page 25, line 10, leave out `remains in force' and insert 'is current'.

No. 19, in page 25, line 11, leave out from beginning to end of line 14 and insert
`if that day falls within the period of three years beginning with the date of the document containing the authorisation and subsection (3A) does not apply.'—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Amendment proposed: No. 83, in page 25, line 13, leave out 'three' and insert `ten'.—[Mr. Dobson.]

Question put, That the amendment be made:—

The House divided: Ayes 259, Noes 296.

Division No. 154]
[11.29 pm


AYES


Abbott, Ms Diane
Darling, Alistair


Adams, Mrs Irene
Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)


Ainger, Nick
Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)


Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)
Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)


Allen, Graham
Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'l)


Alton, David
Denham, John


Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)
Dixon, Don


Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)
Dobson, Frank


Armstrong, Hilary
Donohoe, Brian H.


Ashton, Joe
Dowd, Jim


Austin-Walker, John
Dunnachie, Jimmy


Barnes, Harry
Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth


Barron, Kevin
Eagle, Ms Angela


Battle, John
Eastham, Ken


Bayley, Hugh
Etherington, Bill


Beckett, Margaret
Evans, John (St Helens N)


Beggs, Roy
Ewing, Mrs Margaret


Beith, Rt Hon A. J.
Fatchett, Derek


Benn, Rt Hon Tony
Field, Frank (Birkenhead)


Bennett, Andrew F.
Fisher, Mark


Benton, Joe
Flynn, Paul


Bermingham, Gerald
Foster, Derek (B'p Auckland)


Berry, Dr. Roger
Foster, Don (Bath)


Betts, Clive
Foulkes, George


Blunkett, David
Fraser, John


Boateng, Paul
Fyfe, Maria


Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)
Galbraith, Sam


Boyce, Jimmy
Galloway, George


Boyes, Roland
Gapes, Mike


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Garrett, John


Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)
Gerrard, Neil


Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)
Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John


Burden, Richard
Godman, Dr Norman A.


Byers, Stephen
Godsiff, Roger


Caborn, Richard
Golding, Mrs Llin


Callaghan, Jim
Gordon, Mildred


Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)
Gould, Bryan


Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)
Graham, Thomas


Campbell-Savours, D. N.
Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)


Canavan, Dennis
Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)


Cann, Jamie
Grocott, Bruce


Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)
Gunnell, John


Chisholm, Malcolm
Hain, Peter


Clapham, Michael
Hall, Mike


Clark, Dr David (South Shields)
Hanson, David


Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)
Hardy, Peter


Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)
Harman, Ms Harriet


Clelland, David
Harvey, Nick


Clwyd, Mrs Ann
Henderson, Doug


Coffey, Ann
Heppell, John


Connarty, Michael
Hill, Keith (Streatham)


Cook, Robin (Livingston)
Hinchliffe, David


Corbett, Robin
Hoey, Kate


Corbyn, Jeremy
Hood, Jimmy


Corston, Ms Jean
Howarth, George (Knowsley N)


Cousins, Jim
Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)


Cox, Tom
Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)


Cryer, Bob
Hughes, Roy (Newport E)


Cummings, John
Hume, John


Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)
Hutton, John


Cunningham, Dr John (C'p'l'nd)
Ingram, Adam


Dafis, Cynog
Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)


Dalyell, Tam
Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)





Jamieson, David
Pendry, Tom


Johnston, Sir Russell
Pickthall, Colin


Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)
Pike, Peter L.


Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)
Pope, Greg


Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)
Powell, Ray (Ogmore)


Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)
Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)


Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)
Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)


Jowell, Tessa
Primarolo, Dawn


Keen, Alan
Purchase, Ken


Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)
Quin, Ms Joyce


Khabra, Piara S.
Radice, Giles


Kilfoyle, Peter
Randall, Stuart


Kirkwood, Archy
Raynsford, Nick


Leighton, Ron
Reid, Dr John


Lestor, Joan (Eccles)
Robertson, George (Hamilton)


Lewis, Terry
Roche, Mrs. Barbara


Litherland, Robert
Rogers, Allan


Livingstone, Ken
Rooker, Jeff


Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)
Rooney, Terry


Llwyd, Elfyn
Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)


Lynne, Ms Liz
Ross, William (E Londonderry)


McAllion, John
Rowlands, Ted


McAvoy, Thomas
Ruddock, Joan


McCartney, Ian
Salmond, Alex


Macdonald, Calum
Sheerman, Barry


McFall, John
Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert


McGrady, Eddie
Shore, Rt Hon Peter


McKelvey, William
Short, Clare


Mackinlay, Andrew
Simpson, Alan


McLeish, Henry
Skinner, Dennis


Maclennan, Robert
Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)


McMaster, Gordon
Smith, C. (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)


McNamara, Kevin
Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)


Madden, Max
Snape, Peter


Mahon, Alice
Soley, Clive


Mallon, Seamus
Spearing, Nigel


Marek, Dr John
Spellar, John


Marshall, David (Shettleston)
Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)


Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)
Steinberg, Gerry


Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)
Stevenson, George


Martlew, Eric
Stott, Roger


Maxton, John
Strang, Dr. Gavin


Meacher, Michael
Taylor, Rt Hon John D. (Strgfd)


Meale, Alan
Taylor, Matthew (Truro)


Michael, Alun
Tipping, Paddy


Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)
Trimble, David


Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll Bute)
Turner, Dennis


Milburn, Alan
Tyler, Paul


Miller, Andrew
Wallace, James


Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)
Walley, Joan


Molyneaux, Rt Hon James
Wardell, Gareth (Gower)


Moonie, Dr Lewis
Wareing, Robert N


Morgan, Rhodri
Watson, Mike


Morley, Elliot
Welsh, Andrew


Morris, Rt Hon A. (Wy'nshawe)
Wicks, Malcolm


Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)
Wigley, Dafydd


Mowlam, Marjorie
Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)


Mudie, George
Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)


Mullin, Chris
Wilson, Brian


Murphy, Paul
Winnick, David


Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon
Wise, Audrey


O'Brien, Michael (N W'kshire)
Worthington, Tony


O'Brien, William (Normanton)
Wray, Jimmy


O'Hara, Edward
Wright, Dr Tony


Olner, William



O'Neill, Martin
Tellers for the Ayes:


Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Mr. Jack Thompson and


Paisley, Rev Ian
Mr. Jon Owen Jones.


NOES


Adley, Robert
Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)


Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)
Ashby, David


Aitken, Jonathan
Aspinwall, Jack


Alexander, Richard
Atkins, Robert


Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)
Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)


Allason, Rupert (Torbay)
Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)


Amess, David
Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)


Ancram, Michael
Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)


Arbuthnot, James
Baldry, Tony


Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)
Banks, Matthew (Southport)






Banks, Robert (Harrogate)
Garnier, Edward


Bates, Michael
Gill, Christopher


Batiste, Spencer
Gillan, Cheryl


Bellingham, Henry
Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair


Bendall, Vivian
Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles


Beresford, Sir Paul
Gorman, Mrs Teresa


Biffen, Rt Hon John
Grant, Sir Anthony (Cambs SW)


Blackburn, Dr John G.
Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)


Body, Sir Richard
Greenway, John (Ryedale)


Booth, Hartley
Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)


Boswell, Tim
Grylls, Sir Michael


Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia
Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn


Bowden, Andrew
Hague, William


Bowis, John
Hamilton, Rt Hon Archie (Epsom)


Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes
Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)


Brazier, Julian
Hampson, Dr Keith


Bright, Graham
Hanley, Jeremy


Brooke, Rt Hon Peter
Hannam, Sir John


Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)
Hargreaves, Andrew


Browning, Mrs. Angela
Harris, David


Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)
Haselhurst, Alan


Budgen, Nicholas
Hawkins, Nick


Burns, Simon
Hawksley, Warren


Burt, Alistair
Hayes, Jerry


Butler, Peter
Heald, Oliver


Butterfill, John
Heathcoat-Amory, David


Carlisle, John (Luton North)
Hendry, Charles


Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)
Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael


Carrington, Matthew
Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.


Carttiss, Michael
Hill, James (Southampton Test)


Cash, William
Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)


Channon, Rt Hon Paul
Horam, John


Chapman, Sydney
Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)
Howard, Rt Hon Michael


Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ruclif)
Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)


Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey
Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)


Coe, Sebastian
Hughes Robert G. (Harrow W)


Congdon, David
Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)


Conway, Derek
Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)


Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)
Hunter, Andrew


Coombs, Simon (Swindon)
Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas


Cope, Rt Hon Sir John
Jack, Michael


Couchman, James
Jackson, Robert (Wantage)


Cran, James
Jenkin, Bernard


Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)
Jessel, Toby


Davies, Quentin (Stamford)
Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey


Day, Stephen
Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)


Deva, Nirj Joseph
Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)


Devlin, Tim
Jopling, Rt Hon Michael


Dicks, Terry
Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine


Dorrell, Stephen
Key, Robert


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Kilfedder, Sir James


Dover, Den
King, Rt Hon Tom


Duncan, Alan
Kirkhope, Timothy


Duncan-Smith, Iain
Knapman, Roger


Dunn, Bob
Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)


Durant, Sir Anthony
Knight, Greg (Derby N)


Dykes, Hugh
Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)


Eggar, Tim
Kynoch, George (Kincardine)


Elletson, Harold
Lait, Mrs Jacqui


Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)
Lang, Rt Hon Ian


Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)
Lawrence, Sir Ivan


Evans, Roger (Monmouth)
Legg, Barry


Evennett, David
Lennox-Boyd, Mark


Faber, David
Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)


Fabricant, Michael
Lidington, David


Fenner, Dame Peggy
Lightbown, David


Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)
Lilley, Rt Hon Peter


Fishburn, Dudley
Lloyd, Peter (Fareham)


Forman, Nigel
Lord, Michael


Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)
Luff, Peter


Forth, Eric
Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas


Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)
Maclean, David


Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)
McLoughlin, Patrick


Freeman, Roger
McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick


French, Douglas
Madel, David


Fry, Peter
Maitland, Lady Olga


Gale, Roger
Malone, Gerald


Gallie, Phil
Mans, Keith


Gardiner, Sir George
Marland, Paul





Marlow, Tony
Soames, Nicholas


Marshall, John (Hendon S)
Speed, Sir Keith


Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)
Spencer, Sir Derek


Martin, David (Portsmouth S)
Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)


Mawhinney, Dr Brian
Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)


Merchant, Piers
Spink, Dr Robert


Milligan, Stephen
Spring, Richard


Mills, Iain
Sproat, Iain


Mitchell, Sir David (Hants NW)
Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)


Moate, Sir Roger
Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John


Monro, Sir Hector
Steen, Anthony


Montgomery, Sir Fergus
Stephen, Michael


Moss, Malcolm
Stewart, Allan


Needham, Richard
Streeter, Gary


Nelson, Anthony
Sumberg, David


Neubert, Sir Michael
Sweeney, Walter


Newton, Rt Hon Tony
Sykes, John


Nicholls, Patrick
Tapsell, Sir Peter


Nicholson, David (Taunton)
Taylor, Ian (Esher)


Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)
Taylor, John M. (Solihull)


Norris, Steve
Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)


Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley
Temple-Morris, Peter


Oppenheim, Phillip
Thomason, Roy


Ottaway, Richard
Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)


Page, Richard
Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)


Paice, James
Thornton, Sir Malcolm


Patnick, Irvine
Thurnham, Peter


Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey
Townend, John (Bridlington)


Pawsey, James
Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)


Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth
Tracey, Richard


Pickles, Eric
Tredinnick, David


Porter, Barry (Wirral S)
Trend, Michael


Porter, David (Waveney)
Twinn, Dr Ian


Portillo, Rt Hon Michael
Vaughan, Sir Gerard


Powell, William (Corby)
Waldegrave, Rt Hon William


Rathbone, Tim
Walden, George


Redwood, John
Walker, Bill (N Tayside)


Renton, Rt Hon Tim
Waller, Gary


Richards, Rod
Ward, John


Riddick, Graham
Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)


Rifkind, Rt Hon. Malcolm
Waterson, Nigel


Robathan, Andrew
Watts, John


Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn
Wells, Bowen


Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)
Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John


Robinson, Mark (Somerton)
Whitney, Ray


Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)
Whittingdale, John


Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela
Widdecombe, Ann


Ryder, Rt Hon Richard
Wiggin, Sir Jerry


Sackville, Tom
Willetts, David


Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim
Wilshire, David


Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas
Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)


Shaw, David (Dover)
Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)


Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)
Wolfson, Mark


Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian
Wood, Timothy


Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)
Yeo, Tim


Shersby, Michael
Young, Sir George (Acton)


Sims, Roger



Skeet, Sir Trevor
Tellers for the Ayes:


Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)
Mr. Andrew Mitchell and


Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)
Mr. Andrew Mackay.

Question accordingly negatived.

Amendments made: No. 20, in page 25, line 15, at beginning insert—
'(3A) This subsection applies if'.

No. 21, in page 25, line 27, leave out 'an' and insert 'a relevant'.

No. 22, in page 25, line 32, at end insert—
'() so much of the increase referred to in subsection (4)(b) is relevant as is not attributable solely to an increase in the wages payable on the relevant day.'.

No. 23, in page 25, line 33, at end insert—
, subject to subsection (5A) below'.'.

No. 24, in page 25, line 40, at end insert—
'(5A) Where the relevant increase is attributable to an increase in any percentage by reference to which the worker's


subscription deductions are calculated, subsection (5) above shall have effect with the substitution, in paragraph (a), for the reference to the amount of the increase and the increased amount of the deductions of a reference to the percentage before and the percentage after the increase.'

No. 25, in page 25, line 45, at end insert—
'() Where arrangements, whether included in subscription deduction arrangements or not, exist between the parties to subscription deduction arrangements for the making from workers' wages of deductions representing payments to the union which are additional to subscription deductions, the amount of the deductions representing such additional payments shall be treated for the purposes of this section (where they would otherwise not be so treated) as part of the subscription deductions.'—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 12

EXTENSION OF RIGHT NOT TO BE UNJUSTIFIABLY DISCIPLINED

Amendments made: No. 26, in page 27, line 14, leave out `or'

No. 27, in page 27, line 18, at end insert `or
(j) requiring the union to do an act which the union is, by any provision of this Act, required to do on the requisition of a member.'

No. 28, in page 27, line 18, at end insert—

`(2) In section 65(7) of the 1992 Act (definitions), at the end, there shall be inserted the following—
"require" (on the part of an individual) includes request or apply for, and "requisition" shall be construed accordingly".'—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 13

REQUIREMENT OF POSTAL BALLOT

Mr. McLoughlin: I beg to move amendment No. 29, in page 27, line 22, at beginning insert
'Except as regards persons falling within subsection (2A)'.

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Government amendments Nos. 30, 33, 31, 34, 35, 32 and 36.

Mr. Galbraith: Is it permissible for me to talk about Government amendment No. 33 at this stage, Madam Deputy Speaker?

Madam Deputy Speaker: Yes, that is in order.

Mr. Galbraith: Thank you. I shall not delay the House long. As the Minister will point out, the amendment is one of the concessions that the Government made to the Opposition, following our frequent well-reasoned and eloquent propositions in Committee.
The following issue is at stake: according to the wording in the Bill, when employers are notified of people taking industrial action, is it necessary for them to be informed of the employees' names and addresses? The Minister and I had a long debate on the matter and he agreed to consider it.
As a result of the amendment, the word "identify" has been changed to "ascertain". Of all the amendments that the Minister has given to us, this is the least satisfactory. There is a subtle difference between identify and ascertain. For example, in the House we have to identify the Minister by the area that he represents. Ascertain is similar to identify but leaves the second party with an element of investigation if he wishes to identify the hon. Member concerned. Will it not be necessary to give the employees'

names and addresses to the employer if he or she is to ascertain their identities? The amendment does not deal with our worries.

Mr. McLoughlin: I thought that the amendment, which was the result of representations made by the hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Galbraith), met the requirements requested of us. However, if the hon. Gentleman is concerned, I shall look at the amendment again to ascertain that it meets his requirements.

Mr. Galbraith: Having identified the Minister's generosity, I have been able to ascertain that that is a splendid response and I am happy not to pursue the matter any further.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made: No. 30, in page 27, line 27, at end insert—

'(2A) Where a merchant seaman to whom this subsection applies is entitled to vote in the ballot he must, so far as is reasonably practicable—

(a) have a voting paper made available to him while he is on board the ship or is at a place where the ship is;
(b) be given an opportunity to vote while he is on board the ship or is at a place where the ship is.

(2B) Subsection (2A) applies to a merchant seaman who the trade union reasonably believes will, throughout the period during which votes may be cast in the ballot, be employed in a ship either at sea or at a place outside Great Britain.
(2C) In subsections (2A) and (2B) "merchant seaman" means a person whose employment, or the greater part of it, is carried out on board sea-going ships.' —[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 14

NOTICE OF BALLOT AND SAMPLE VOTING PAPER FOR EMPLOYERS

Amendments made: No. 33, in page 28, leave out lines 14 to 19 and insert —
'(c) describing (so that he can readily ascertain them) the employees of the employer who it is reasonable for the union to believe (at the time when the steps to comply with that paragraph are taken) will be entitled to vote in the ballot.'

No. 31, in page 28, line 33, at end insert—
'(5) This section, in its application to a ballot in which merchant seamen to whom section 230(2A) applies are entitled to vote, shall have effect with the substitution in subsection (3), for references to the voting paper which is to be sent to the employees, of references to the voting paper which is to be sent or otherwise provided to them.'—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 16

SCRUTINY OF BALLOTS

Amendments made: No. 34, in page 29, line 37, at end insert—
`(a) state the name of the independent scrutineer,'.

No. 35, in page 29, line 38, leave out from beginning to `clearly'.

No. 32, in page 29, line 45, at end insert—
'This subsection, in its application to a ballot in which merchant seamen to whom section 230(2A) applies are entitled to vote, shall have effect with the substitution, for the reference to the address to which the voting paper is to be returned, of a reference to the ship to which the seamen belong.'

No. 36, in page 30, line 27, at end insert—
'(4) After section 226B of the 1992 Act there shall be inserted—

Exclusion for small ballots.

226C. Nothing in section 226B, section 229(1A)(a) or section 231B shall impose a requirement on a trade union unless—

(a) the number of members entitled to vote in the ballot, or
(b) where separate workplace ballots are held in accordance with section 228(1), the aggregate of the number of members entitled to vote in each of them, exceeds 50".'—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 19

RIGHT TO MATERNITY LEAVE AND RIGHT TO RETURN TO WORK

Amendments made: No. 1, in page 36, line 44, after 'shall' insert
'subject to sections 36 and 37'.

No. 2, in page 37, line 6, at end insert—
'(3) An employee who has both the right conferred by this section and a corresponding right conferred by her contract of employment or otherwise may take advantage of whichever right is, in any particular respect, the more favourable.'

No. 3, in page 37, line 8, leave out from 'with' to end of line 14 and insert—

'(a) the date which, in accordance with section 36, she notifies to her employer as the date on which she intends her period of absence from work in exercise of her right to maternity leave to commence, or
(b) if earlier, the first day on which she is absent from work wholly or partly because of pregnancy or childbirth after the beginning of the sixth week before the expected week of childbirth.'

No. 37, in page 37, line 26, at end insert
'or until the birth of the child, if later'.

No. 38, in page 37, line 32, leave out from first of' to 'by' and insert
'the period mentioned in subsection (1)'.

No. 4, in page 37, line 43, at end insert—

'Notice of commencement of leave.

36.—(1) An employee shall not have the right conferred by section 33 unless—

(a) she notifies her employer of the date (within the restriction imposed by subsection (2)) ("the notified leave date") on which she intends her period of absence from work in exercise of her right to maternity leave to commence—

(i) not less than twenty-one days before that date, or
(ii) if that is not reasonably practicable, as soon as is reasonably practicable,

(b) where she is first absent from work wholly or partly because of pregnancy or childbirth before the notified leave date or before she has notified such a date and after the beginning of the sixth week before the expected week of childbirth, she notifies her employer as soon as is reasonably practicable that she is absent for that reason, or
(c) where childbirth occurs before the notified leave date or before she has notified such a date, she notifies her employer that she has given birth as soon as is reasonably practicable after the birth,

and any notice she is required to give under paragraphs (a) to (c) shall, if her employer so requests, be given in writing.
(2) No date may be notified under subsection (1)(a) which occurs before the beginning of the eleventh week before the expected week of childbirth.
(3) Where, in the case of an employee, either paragraph (b) or (c) of subsection (1) has fallen to be satisfied, and has been so satisfied, nothing in paragraph (a) of that subsection shall impose any requirement on the employee.'.

No. 5, in page 38, leave out lines 33 to 37. —[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 20

DISMISSAL RIGHTS

Amendments made: No. 6, in page 39, line 6, at end insert—
'() the reason (or, if there is more than one, the principal reason) for her dismissal—

(i) where, before the end of her maternity leave period, she gave to her employer a certificate from a registered medical practitioner stating that by reason of disease or bodily or mental disablement she would be incapable of work after the end of that period, and
(ii) her contract of employment was terminated within the four week period following the end of her maternity leave period in circumstances where she continued to be incapable of work and the certificate relating to her incapacity remained current,

is that she has given birth to a child or any other reason connected with her having given birth to a child,'

No. 43, in page 39, line 39, leave out '(a)'.

No. 44, in page 39, line 46, leave out '(a)'.—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Clause 29

CONSTITUTION OF INDUSTRIAL TRIBUNALS

Amendment proposed: No. 45, in page 44, line 29 at end insert—
'() No order shall be made under subsection (2D) unless a draft of the order has been laid before Parliament and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.'.—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Mr. Jeff Rooker: I wish to speak to the amendment as I believe that legislation passed in the House should have our constituents' footprints across it. While the title of the clause to which the amendment relates is: "Constitution of industrial tribunals", one should rightly call it the "unibunal" clause as I cannot think of another word to describe a tribunal which has one person sitting alone. The amendment is important as the factors set out in subsection (2D) can be brought into effect only by an affirmative resolution.
I wish to illustrate with a constituency case why the House must be careful before it allows a tribunal to become a "unibunal", especially in a case which is not contested, where the employer does not turn up. It is a case with which Ministers, particularly the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, should be familiar, as he has dismissed most of the parliamentary questions that I have asked on the matter in recent months. I have corresponded with Ministers, asked parliamentary questions and even contacted the chair of the tribunal, which took me back to where I started, as he said that he could not tell me any more than he had already said.
I shall take a few minutes to outline the case, as it is crucial. One of my constituents, Mr. Colin Yates, was dismissed by his employers in January 1991 on the ground of redundancy. He appealed to a tribunal against the dismissal, claiming that it was unfair as he had not been consulted or offered alternative employment, which was available.
He won his case at a tribunal hearing in July 1991. The employer did not turn up. The tribunal did not even make a basic award because my constituent had already received


a redundancy payment, but it made a very large compensatory award—more than £33,000—for the loss of salary. That is the highest award made by a tribunal that I have located in my researches. That led my constituent to believe that he was due to obtain a considerable amount of compensation.
At the time of the award there was a maximum statutory level on compensatory awards of £8,925. Yet the chair of the tribunal awarded more than £33,000. My constituent lost £1,400 in unemployment benefit, leaving an expectation of over £7,500.
Here comes the rub. The firm, Bygging Rust Proofing, went into voluntary liquidation in 1991. The law does not allow compensatory awards in respect of unfair dismissal to be paid out of the national insurance fund: the employee goes to the back of the queue, which means that he will never see a penny piece.
That strikes me as ludicrous. In the instance that I have raised, one party did not turn up to contest the case, as set out in new subsection (2C)(f), and a huge compensatory award was made on the merits of the case. Yet, by means of a quirk—the wheeze of voluntary liquidation—the firm was able to avoid paying a penny to an aggrieved ex-employee. I might add that the company is still operating under another name, and that its chief director, Henry Gold, is still a director of what is effectively the same company.
In correspondence, Ministers and—before the general election—their predecessors have dismissed my constituent's case out of hand. They have flatly refused to say that compensatory awards should be met from within the national insurance fund, as is the basic award in unfair dismissal cases.
We may legislate tonight to allow tribunals to engage in City-style procedures, whereby a single person can make a decision which will apparently be fairly easy to accept if it is not contested. Because an employer did not turn up and thus avoided contesting the case that I have cited, a huge award will never be paid. My constituent will not receive a penny.
If the Minister is not prepared to answer my point now, I hope that he will go away and think about it. Perhaps he will look at the volumes of correspondence. It is grossly unfair that, following the making of an award in a public tribunal, a citizen who expects to receive some, if not all, of the money should not receive a penny because of a quirk in the law.
I am sorry to have detained the House at this late hour, but I promised my constituent Colin Yates that, if an occasion arose for me to put his case to the House succinctly without going into laborious detail, I would do so. I have tried every other avenue: I have tried correspondence, parliamentary questions and even writing to the chairman of the tribunal, which got me nowhere. The amendment seemed to be the best hook on which to hang what, in other circumstances, would have been an Adjournment debate. I am grateful to the House for its tolerance.

Mr. McLoughlin: We are to allow industrial tribunal chairmen to sit alone in some very specific cases. As the hon Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) said, the change that we are making is to invoke the affirmative-resolution procedure, which was welcomed by

the Committee and, indeed, will probably be welcomed by the hon. Gentleman. The case to which he referred raises serious questions; perhaps we could meet and discuss it more fully.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I welcome the amendment, which improves new subsections (2C) and (2D). I hope that the Government will continue to find ways in which initial tribunal claims can be heard more quickly, and that they will find more ways of keeping the lawyers out whenever possible. In particular—this applies to a certain extent to clause 30—I hope that there will be some way of ensuring that the appeal tribunal waiting time no longer remains at two years in England and Wales, when it is only five months in Scotland.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 33

FEES FOR EXERCISE OF FUNCTIONS BY ACAS

Amendment made: No. 46, in page 47, line 24, leave out from 'person' to 'unless' in line 26.—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Clause 34

CAREERS SERVICES

Mr. Dobson: I beg to move amendment No. 84, in page 48, line 8, at end insert—
'(1A) In exercising his functions under subsection (11) the Secretary of State shall meet the requirements of disabled persons or persons having learning difficulties.'

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to consider amendment No. 85, in page 48, line 31, at end insert—
'(3A) For the purposes of this section a disabled person is defined in section 1 of the Disabled Persons (Employment) Act 1944, and persons having learning difficulties as defined under section 120, subsections (11) and (12), of the Education Reform Act 1988.'.

Mr. Dobson: I do not want to detain the House unduly, but it is an important principle that if the Government are to privatise the schools careers service they should write into law requirements to meet the particular needs of disabled persons, or persons with learning difficulties. The Government do not want to accept our amendment at this stage, but I should like an undertaking from them that they will reconsider the issue and possibly table amendments in the other place.

Mr. McLoughlin: We have covered some of the points raised by the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues in Committee. I understand the hon. Gentleman's concern about the amendment. I think that we have the powers to deal with the matter. However, I take on board the point made by the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends, and also the representations that have been put to me by my hon. Friends. I very much hope that we can come to an agreement. I hope, too, that, even though we cannot accept the amendment, we shall be able to satisfy the hon. Gentleman by means of orders and the way that we implement the changes.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the way he has responded to the sensible points that have been made by the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) in trying to meet the requirements of disabled people, or people with learning difficulties. I


understand why it is not possible to debate my suggestion that there should be an annual report from the careers service in its new form. If that point could be discussed in another place, it would be possible to consider how the careers service would want to adapt to the changing situation. This, however, is not the time to do that.

Mr. Dobson: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 41

COMMENCEMENT

Amendment made: No. 10, in page 54, line 7, at beginning insert 'Subject to any other commencement provision,'.—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Schedule 1

POLITICAL FUND BALLOTS

Amendments made: No. 60, in page 56, line 43, at end insert—
'(3C) The duty of confidentiality as respects the register is incorporated in the scrutineer's appointment.'

No. 61, in page 57, line 35, at end insert—
'() The duty of confidentiality as respects the register is incorporated in an appointment under this section.'—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Schedule 3

SUSPENSION FROM WORK ON MATERNITY GROUNDS

Amendments made: No. 39, in page 62, line 22, leave out from first 'employee' to 'the' in line 23.

No. 40, in page 62, line 24, at end insert—
'(1A) For alternative work to be suitable for an employee for the purposes of this section—

(a) the work must be of a kind which is both suitable in relation to her and appropriate for her to do in the circumstances; and
(b) the terms and conditions applicable to her for performing the work, if they differ from the corresponding terms and conditions applicable to her for performing the work she normally performs under her contract of employment, must not be substantially less favourable to her than those corresponding terms and conditions.'

No. 41, in page 62, line 45, leave out from beginning to
'and' in line 47 and insert
'work which is suitable alternative work for the purposes of section 46.'—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Schedule 4

PROVISIONS SUBSTITUTED FOR SECTIONS I TO 6 OF 1978 ACT

Amendment made: No. 51, in page 66, leave out lines 26 to 49.—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Schedule 5

EMPLOYMENT PROTECTION IN HEALTH AND SAFETY CASES

Amendment proposed: No. 54, in page 68, line 10, at end insert—
'(bb) being an employee at a place where—

(i) there was no such representative or safety committee, or

(ii) there was such a representative or safety committee but it was not reasonably practicable for the employee to raise the matter by those means,

he brought to his employer's attention, by reasonable means, circumstances connected with his work which he reasonably believed were harmful or potentially harmful to health or safety,'.—[Mr. Michael Forsyth.]

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to discuss Government amendments Nos. 47, 48, 55, 49 and 50.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: If I may speak briefly to the amendment, it brings us to the end of the Report stage and also to what I call the social aspect of the European Community. It is worth recognising that the United Kingdom has one of the best health and safety records in the Community.
Amendment No. 54 deals with an employee at a place where there is no such representative or safety committee. Our law builds on the Act that makes provision for health and safety and on the work of the Health and Safety Executive. It also builds on the tripartite Health and Safety Commission.
I hope that those who are considering the social policy of the European Community in the context of other Bills understand that one of the reasons why our health and safety performance is better than that of most other countries is the co-operation at work between representatives of employees and representatives of employers. As well as the responsibility at individual workplaces, the framework of the Health and Safety Commission is built upon recognition of the expertise, interests and responsibility of people at work.
I recommend that the Treasury Bench should try to build on that as a way of resisting some of the amendments to other Bills and should try to recognise the role of trade unions and the hundreds of thousands of people within the trade union movement who give of their time to represent their fellow workers and, for that matter, who help to protect their own employers from the health and safety risks that would otherwise threaten their businesses.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendments made: No. 47, in page 68, line 11 leave out 'was' and insert 'he reasonably believed to be'.

No. 48, in page 68, line 17 leave out from 'of' to 'he' and insert
'danger which he reasonably believed to be serious arid imminent,'.

No. 55, in page 70, line 5, at end insert—
`(bb) being an employee at a place where—

(i) there was no such representative or safety committee, or
(ii) there was such a representative or safety committee but it was not reasonably practicable for the employee to raise the matter by those means,

brought to his employer's attention, by reasonable means, circumstances connected with his work which he reasonably believed were harmful or potentially harmful to health or safety,'.

No. 49, in page 70, line 6, leave out 'was' and insert 'he reasonably believed to be'.

No. 50, in page 70, line 12 leave out from 'of' to end and insert
'danger which he reasonably believed to be serious and imminent,'.—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Schedule 7

CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS

Amendments made: No. 7, in page 85, line 6 leave out second 'and'.

No. 8, in page 85, line 10, at end insert—
'(v) after that definition there shall be inserted—
" notified leave date" shall be construed in accordance with section 36;",'.

No. 42, in page 87, line 5, after 'begins' insert
'or where that day falls within an employee's maternity leave period or within the further period up to the day on which an employee exercises her right to return to work under section 39, the day before the beginning of the maternity leave period.'

No. 62, in page 88, line 2, at beginning insert—
'. In section 25 of the 1992 Act (application to Certification Officer as respects failures in relation to the register of members)—

(a) in subsection (1), after the words "section 24" there shall be inserted the words "or 24A"; and
(b) after subsection (7), there shall be inserted—

(8) The Certification Officer shall not entertain an application for a declaration as respects an alleged failure to comply with the requirements of section 24A in relation to a ballot to which that section applies unless the application is made before the end of the period of one year beginning with the last day on which votes could be cast in the ballot".
In section 26 of the 1992 Act (application to court as respects failures in relation to the register of members)—

(a) in subsection (1), after the words "section 24" there shall be inserted the words "or 24A"; and
(b) after subsection (6) there shall be inserted—

(7) The court shall not entertain an application for a declaration as respects an alleged failure to comply with the requirements of section 24A in relation to a ballot to which that section applies unless the application is made before the end of the period of one year beginning with the last day on which votes could be cast in the ballot".'—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Schedule 8

TRANSITIONAL PROVISIONS AND SAVINGS

Amendments made: No. 52, in page 98, line 36, at end insert
`; and subsections (2) and (4) of that section shall apply accordingly.'.

No. 53, in page 98, leave out lines 37 to 44.—[Mr. McLoughlin.]

Schedule 9

REPEALS AND REVOCATIONS

Amendment made: No. 11, in page 103, line 20, column 3, at end insert 'Sections 115 and 116'.

Bill to be read the Third time this day

Hill Livestock (Compensatory Allowances)

Dr. Gavin Strang: I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Hill Livestock (Compensatory Allowances) (Amendment) Regulations 1993 (S.I., 1993, No. 70), dated 18th January 1993, a copy of which was laid before this House on 18th January, be annulled.

Mr. Bob Cryer: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. There is notification on the Order Paper that the
Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments has not yet completed its consideration of the Instrument.
That rubric is no longer true because this afternoon, at a meeting of the Joint Committee, we completed our consideration. In the Vote Office, a very brief extract from our report is available to hon. Members. However, I must point out that the terms of the Standing Order under which the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments is established places an obligation on that Committee to provide a report for the House. Had the matter been more complicated or had it required evidence or a further memorandum, it would not have been possible to have provided the information in time for the debate. That would have negated the whole purpose of having a Joint Committee to review statutory instruments and report to the House. I hope that the Government will note that they should seek to lay instruments on the Order Paper only when the Joint Committee has reported.

Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): I know that the hon. Gentleman has great experience of these matters. He will know that the arrangement of business is not a matter for the Chair, but I have no doubt that Ministers will have noted what the hon. Gentleman said.

Dr. Strang: Successive Governments have recognised the need to provide special assistance for livestock farmers in our hill areas. That assistance is necessary to compensate them for the difficult farming conditions in our hills and uplands.
It was the post-war Labour Government who enacted the Hill Farming Act 1946, which was introduced to rehabilitate hill farming land. Farmers who adopted hill improvement schemes received capital grants for farm buildings, houses, roads, fencing and land improvement. The Act also made long-term provision for headage payments for hill cows and hill sheep.
In 1972 it was the Conservative Government who negotiated an annex to the treaty of accession to the European Community which enabled the British Government to continue the hill subsidies. Again, a Labour Government were in power in 1975 when the hill livestock compensatory allowance directive was negotiated.

Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Dr. Strang: In a moment.
That directive enabled the hill subsidies to be put on a European Community basis.

Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman has forgotten Joe Godber's work on this


matter. On 1 May 1973, the Council, at his behest, agreed a resolution about farming in poorer areas. He had to fight very hard for that. The hon. Gentleman omitted that little bit.

Dr. Strang: No, the hon. Lady has got that wrong. I remember putting a question to the right hon. Gentleman when he was Minister for Agriculture. He made a contribution when the Conservative Government were in power from 1970–74.

Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: I know, at column 997.

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. This is not a private conversation.

Dr. Strang: It is important to recognise that hill livestock compensatory allowances are paid to compensate farmers for the natural handicaps in the hills. Hon. Members who represent constituencies with hills and uplands well know the severe conditions with which the farmers have to cope. They know that hill farmers cannot be expected to compete with farms in the lowlands without special Government assistance. They also know that the hill farming measures have been successful in maintaining the population in our rural areas and in supporting the rural economy.
The purpose of the Opposition's prayer is to reject the cut in the hill livestock compensatory allowances for sheep in severely disadvantaged areas announced by the Government in December. If the prayer is carried, the Government's regulations cutting the HLCAs will be annulled. In those circumstances, the Government would have a duty to implement the wishes of Parliament and table new regulations maintaining the HLCAs at their current levels.

Mr. Jonathan Evans: Will the hon. Gentleman clarify the position for those of us who are concerned about the reduction in HLCAs? If the prayer is carried, will it be possible to make HLCA payments, or will they be stopped from tonight?

Dr. Strang: I have just explained that. This is the proper procedure for voting against the cuts. The Government have an obligation to implement the wishes of Parliament. If the hon. Gentleman wants to stand up for his hill farmers and their families tonight, he must vote with the Opposition.
The Government have advanced two arguments to justify the cuts in the HLCAs. First, they have referred to an improvement in hill farm incomes in recent years. Secondly, they have pointed to the increase in the hill ewe premium and to the less-favoured areas supplement to that hill ewe premium.
But the Government must recognise that, while it is true that on their own figures hill farm incomes are estimated to rise this year and the previous year, that increase is from a desperately low level. The average incomes are well below the 1988–89 level and significantly below the average in the five years from 1983–84 to 1987–88.
According to the Government's figures for the distribution of farm incomes for 1991, the most recent year for which figures are available, 48 per cent. of English LFA farms produced for their occupants a cash income of less than £10,000. In Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland the corresponding figures were respectively 42 per cent., 37 per cent. and 62 per cent.
Some farmers earn a great deal less. A recent survey showed that in Wales 17 per cent. of farmers in the less-favoured areas earned less than £5,000 a year. We welcome the evidence that hill farm incomes are increasing, but they are rising from a dismally low level.
We also welcome the increase in the hill ewe premium, arising from the devaluation of sterling in October and the consequent devaluation of the green pound in January, and in the less-favoured areas supplement, agreed at the Agricultural Council in December.
It is true that the combined effect of those increases more than offsets the cut in the HLCAs. But the Minister must appreciate that it is unfair to tell hill farmers that, because their incomes now show some prospect of rising after such desperately low levels during the 1980s, the HLCAs will be cut.
Why did farmers from throughout the United Kingdom converge on Parliament earlier this year to protest against the cuts in the HLCAs? It was because they saw the cuts as unprecedented. It is true that previous Governments had failed to increase the HLCAs in some years, but the farmers regarded it as unprecedented for a Government to cut them in cash terms.
It is true that farmers hoped that their incomes were beginning to rise again, but from the Government's statements it seemed clear that they had no idea of the level of poverty and misery which had occurred in the hill areas throughout the 1980s because of the total collapse in those incomes. When an income falls by 50 per cent., as these incomes fell between 1988–89 and 1989–90, one needs an increase of 100 per cent. to return to the original level. That is something which the Government do not seem to appreciate in all their statements about this.
We shall vote for this motion because we want a fair deal for hill farmers and their families. We shall vote for it because we shall be voting against depopulation in the hills and the uplands. We shall vote for it out of our recognition of the crucial importance of hill farming to the rural economy in some of the most beautiful parts of these islands. I urge all hon. Members to support the Opposition motion.

Mr. Cryer: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I wonder whether there has been any explanation of why the Minister of Agriculture is not here—

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member well knows that that is not a point of order for me.

The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. David Curry): It seems to me to be both natural and right that a member of the ministerial team in the Ministry of Agriculture who has a very large number of hill farmers in his constituency and knows them well should seek to reply to this debate, because—[Interruption.] Well, let me finish my point. Because it is natural that my personal experience of my constituency leads me to want to do so. I asked my right hon. Friend that I should speak in this debate, and he agreed that I should. It is my responsibility, and I will take that responsibility. I cannot see why anyone at all should complain.

Ms. Hilary Armstrong: Perhaps the Minister is unaware of the great insult felt by hill


farmers because of the words and pronouncements of the Minister of Agriculture. That is why we want him here. It is he who insulted hill farmers.

Mr. Curry: We have had the thinnest speech that I have heard from an Opposition spokesman for a very long time. We have now had an entirely irrelevant point from the hon. Lady. Clearly, the Opposition have not got their hearts in it. I think that they are beginning to regret that they launched this operation.

Dr. Strang: What concerns Labour hon. Members is that the Minister was seen in the Chamber during the previous Division. Why is he not present for the debate?

Mr. Curry: This is typical of the Opposition. They are not concerned about hill farmers at all. If they are so concerned about hill farmers, why have they spent the past five minutes talking about my right hon. Friend?

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. There is too much noise and now too much heat is being generated. Perhaps the hon. Member can now continue with his speech. May I add that a number of hon. Members have indicated that they wish to speak in this fairly short debate.

Mr. Curry: The decision on HLCAs has to be seen in the context of the total support for farmers in the uplands which is directly linked to production. I am not talking about the environmentally sensitive areas; I am not talking about the countryside stewardship; I am talking about the totality of support. [Interruption.] Madam Deputy Speaker, there is a choice. I do not mind giving way. I often give way. It simply eats into the time that other hon. Members have to intervene in the debate. I will give way once more, and that will be 50 per cent. more than the Opposition spokesman did.

Mr. Cynog Dafis: I was wondering whether the Minister would like to meditate on the significance of the fact that the Minister of Agriculture said that the market conditions had improved to such an extent that the HLCA must be cut. As chairman of the Agriculture Council, he suggested that the sheep annual premium supplement needed to be increased because of the difficult conditions in the sheep meat market especially for producers in the uplands.

Mr. Curry: If the hon. Gentleman waits, I will come to the figures. My right hon. Friend was an excellent chairman of the Agriculture Council for three—[Interruption.] I hope that farmers will listen to the irrelevant babble coming from the Opposition Benches and judge how seriously they take these matters.
There are three sources of support for farmers. There is the market place, which is sometimes forgotten; there is the ewe premium, and that obviously depends on the pound-ecu rate and the supplement; and there is the HLCA payment. When all these are taken into consideration, as they all were taken into consideration at the beginning of this calculation, the hill sheep farmer is significantly better off.

Mr. Alex Carlile: rose—

Mr. Curry: I will not give way; I want to make some progress.

Madam Deputy Speaker: If the Minister is not giving way, the hon. Member must resume his seat, as I am sure he knows.

Mr. Carlile: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Is it right for a Minister to misinform the House? The fact is that hill farmers will be worse off this year. Next year there may be a marginal improvement. Why will he not tell the truth to the House, or leave it to his Minister of Agriculture to do so?

Madam Deputy Speaker: The hon. and learned Member raised that as a point of order. The accuracy of what the Minister or anybody else says is not a matter for the Chair—thank goodness.

Mr. Curry: The figures that I will give are absolutely accurate. There is no purpose whatsoever in my seeking to misrepresent the situation. I cannot think why the hon. and learned Gentleman thinks that there would be the slightest profit in that, and I do not intend to do it.

Mr. Colin Shepherd: I would be most grateful if my hon. Friend could explore the question of the returns from the market place. I have to say in all honesty that my hill farmers are puzzled as to how their figures match up with his. I do not doubt that there is an adequate explanation, but the sort of figures that I am quoted are these. Between 1991 and 1992, one farmer dropped 13.2 per cent. in the market place, another 17.2 per cent., another 7.6 per cent. and another 21.7 per cent. So, if they are supposed to have had a better return from the market place for fat lambs, possibly there is some aspect that I am not taking into account. Can my hon. Friend help?

Mr. Curry: I will try to help my hon. Friend. I will give him the figures, which are, of course, arrived at by independent academic authorities. Those are the figures on which we have based all our calculations in the past and they have not changed in this circumstance.
It is entirely wrong to isolate the HLCA from the totality of support that farmers get, as if there were a moral virtue in the HLCA payment which does not obtain with any other payment. The decision on the HLCA was taken after the pound had left the exchange rate mechanism, when the consequent devaluation was clearly signalled, and when the imminent abolition of MCAs meant that that would work through very rapidly indeed into the price farmers received. The three factors are income, the ewe premium and the HLCAs. I will deal with them in turn. The income survey is conducted by universities and colleges, except in Northern Ireland, where it is conducted by the Government Department there. It is based on 850 hill livestock farms in the less-favoured areas. The survey has been carried on for 50 years and this particular method has been carried on for over 10 years. Nobody, and that includes the National Farmers Union, disputes the methodology used or the legitimacy of the survey.

Mr. Robert Maclennan: I thank the Minister for giving way in this short debate. If the methodology is accepted—and I do not believe that it is accepted by my farmers—can he explain why all the farmers in the severely disadvantaged areas, who do not seem to be singled out in the surveys, are of one mind in believing that their position, as expressed to Members by their bankers, their accountants and those in the Benefits


Agency who are having to pay out family credit to farmers this year, is so much worse, and that their plight seems not to be appreciated at all by the Government?

Mr. Curry: That is not true on any count. We carry out surveys on income. They are not disputed in their base because they are carried out by academic institutions and not by the Government. They are not rigged. The NFU and the Scottish NFU have not disputed their validity. I do not deny that the income increase is from a low base. I am not trying to pretend that is not the case. However, it has been an increase from a low base and refers to representative farms.

Mr. Michael Connarty: The Minister mentioned the Scottish NFU. Just last night I received a call from a member of the executive of the Forth Valley NFU telling me that the figures for Scotland that the Minister quoted misrepresented income figures, as income for the year 1992 did not relate to a 12-month year but to the period from 1 January 1992 to 31 March 1993. Suddenly we had a 15-month year. Those figures were quoted in the House and denied by the Scottish NFU.

Mr. Curry: All the figures are in the Library of the House of Commons, so the hon. Gentleman can examine them, but those income figures are identitical to those which we have used in the past. When we use them as the basis for demanding an increase, the complaints are far fewer than when they are used to justify a decline.
Livestock farms in the severely disadvantaged areas throughout the United Kingdom—that is 90 per cent. of the less-favoured areas—have seen their income go up by 35 per cent. in real terms in the two years to mid-February 1993. In England, the net farm income on specialist sheep farms has gone from £6,600 to £14,200. That relates just to the farm and does not include bed and breakfast or the wife's activities. It takes into account the costs of depreciation, unpaid family labour, valuation charges and imputed rent for owner-occupiers. In Scotland the equivalent figure has risen from £8,100 to £11,400 and in Wales the same survey shows that the figures have increased from £10,500 to £18,700 and for Northern Ireland, where all the farms are livestock farms, the figure has increased from £4,000 to£6,800—[Interruption.]Hon. Gentlemen should complain to the University College, Aberystwyth, because that institution provided the figures.

Mr. Alex Carlile: rose—

Rev. Ian Paisley: rose—

Mr. Eddie McGrady: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. The Minister is misinforming the House about the figures for Northern Ireland because the Department of Agriculture for Northern Ireland stated quite recently that the average hill-farm income for Northern Ireland is exactly £3,761. If the Minister considers that to be an adequate income, he is being ridiculous.

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I have already told another hon. Gentleman that accuracy is not a matter for the Chair and is not a point of order.

Mr. Curry: The figures—

Several hon. Members: rose—

Madam Deputy Speaker: It is not a point of order. Mr. Curry.

Mr. Curry: The figures are in the Library of the House of Commons. I am quoting figures which are in the public domain and which are the results of the surveys upon which we have always based our actions in the past. I am sorry if hon. Gentlemen do not like the outcome of the figures, but they remain the same, and the figures for cash in hand are proportionately larger.

Several hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Curry: I shall not give way again because it would not be fair to those who wish to speak in the debate.

Mr. Seamus Mallon: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. The matter in dispute is central to the case that will be made by Members representing constituencies in Northern Ireland. The Minister with responsibilities for agriculture in Northern Ireland is sitting next to the Minister of State. Can he confirm or deny the figures presented by the Department of Agriculture for Northern Ireland? Would it not be advisable to ask him to clear it up now and take the opportunity to stand by his figures—or not?

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I have made it quite clear that the accuracy or otherwise of figures has nothing whatsoever to do with the Chair and is not a point of order.

Rev. Ian Paisley: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Madam Deputy Speaker: I hope that it is not the same point of order.

Rev. Ian Paisley: No. If the Minister is giving figures from the Department of Agriculture for Northern Ireland, let him give the figures and not misrepresent what he is saying to the House.

Mr. Curry: I am misrepresenting nothing; I am reporting the outcome of the surveys.
The ewe premium is paid in three instalments. Without any devaluation, the ewe premium would have been £14·61. After devaluation, it comes to £17·25. The supplement for less-favoured areas was £4·37. After devaluation plus the additional £1.05, this takes the figure to £6·57. The overall net gain on that subsidy is £4·84 per ewe.
The final payment for the ewe premium and the supplement is £23·82 per ewe. That is the supplement for hardy ewes in severely disadvantaged areas. When the third instalment of the ewe premium is paid in early April, the overwhelming majority of 90,000 claims will receive a sum of about £10·50.
The third strand is the hill livestock compensatory allowance. The high rate was £8·75, and that has gone down to £6·50. The lower rate, which is for non-hardy ewes, has gone down by the same amount proportionally to £3·60. In the disadvantaged areas, there has been no cut in the hill livestock compensatory allowance; it has been increased to £2·86.
If we net all that out, we find that farmers in severely disadvantaged areas will be £2·59 per ewe better off with regard to their hardy ewes, which are 58 per cent. of the flock. They will be £3·54 per ewe better off for their non-hardy ewes, which are 28 per cent. of the flock. In the


disadvantaged areas, farmers will be £5·25 per ewe better off with regard to about 14 per cent. of the flock. Hill farmers in severely disadvantaged areas will get £13 per hardy ewe more than farmers in the low land. It is worth while reporting that that is the case.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his full explanation. I represent hill farmers and those in less-favoured areas. If the figures are so good in my hon. Friend's view, why are the National Farmers Union, the Country Landowners Association and the Council for the Protection of Rural England—none of them really anti-Tory organisations—so worried about the income of hill farmers and their ability to maintain themselves and the countryside which many of us consider so important?

Mr. Curry: My hon. Friend is not an anti-Tory organisation, either. Did he really expect any of those organisations to applaud the cuts? We know that they do not applaud them. They would prefer the cuts not to be made.
What I am saying to those organisations and many individual farmers is that the net effect of the cuts will leave them better off than many anticipated when they made their farm plans. When they made their farm plans, I am sure that they were not banking on a ewe premium at the present rate.

Mr. James Wallace: The Minister has just accepted that there is a cut. In the figures which he has just given—even if we accept his figures as to the net effect—he made it perfectly clear that the positive net effect is much less for those in severely disadvantaged areas than for those in disadvantaged areas. Surely the whole point of the hill livestock compensatory allowance is to give specific advantage to those who have difficulties because of transport and other factors. The Minister is eroding the differential, and that is the whole point.

Mr. Curry: In certain respects, low-land sheep producers found themselves in the most difficult circumstances recently. Upland farmers have the push in the hill livestock compensatory allowance for the less-favoured premium. The differential between the allowances for upland farmers and some lowland farmers is significant. Lowland farmers have found themselves in some difficulties.

Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Will my hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Curry: I shall give way to my hon. Friend. It will be the last time that I give way, otherwise no one else will get a chance to speak.

Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: As I do not come from Cheshire, and I have farmed 1,600 feet up, I know something about sheep. My farmers appreciate the battle that my hon. Friend the Minister had to get the extra 79p. It was a bit of very smart footwork on his part. He got it a year early. But the sting is in the tail. Devaluation gives us a bonus for now. But what will happen if it goes the other way? Can my hon. Friend guarantee that we will then get the benefit? If the pound goes the wrong way, will he increase the compensatory allowance?

Mr. Curry: I had better not speculate about which is the right way for the pound to go. Just as on this occasion we examined all the factors in determining the final conclusion, so next year we shall examine all the factors present in determining the recommendations that we make. That would be a sensible thing to do.

Mr. George Foulkes: Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Curry: No. I have given way infinitely more frequently than the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman.

Mr. Foulkes: I am grateful to the Minister.

Mr. Curry: No. I shall not give way.
Some farmers will not receive the sums that I have quoted. I wish to make that clear to the House so that I am not accused of misrepresentation. They include those with more than 1,000 ewes, to whom the ceiling applies if they have not organised their partnership schemes—but most of them have. They also include those with un-tupped Herdwick shearlings. I will translate for those who might have a problem with that. The Herdwick is a sheep; un-tupped means that it has not yet had the pleasure of a ram; shearling means that it has been sheared once but is less than two years old. Such sheep receive only a 70 per cent. premium. But there are only 25,000 sheep in the country to which that applies.

Mr. Foulkes: Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Curry: No.
I shall give some typical consequences of the change. Farmer No. 1 claims on 662 ewes, as against 652 last year and 40 cows, which is the same as last year. His total subsidy from HLCA and the ewe premium will be £22,485. That is £3,868 more than the previous year—an increase of 20·1 per cent.
A second farmer has 483 ewes, on top of which are 102 Herdwicks. Last year he had 439, on top of which were 84 Herdwicks. He has five cattle—unchanged from last year. He will receive £17,512 in support from the two schemes. That is £3,879 up on the previous year—an increase of 28·5 per cent.
A third farmer has 607 ewes, as against 590 the previous year. His number of cows is unchanged at 72. He will receive £21,318—an increase of £4,235. A farmer with 683 ewes, against 696 the previous year—so he has destocked somewhat—with no cattle, against six the previous year, will receive £19,835. That is an increase of £3,031, or 18 per cent.

Mr. Barry Porter: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it appropriate in this debate to refer to the problem of the hill shipyard workers, the hill steel workers and other workers who apparently do not get all this nonsense? They would not know—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): Order. I think that I can help the hon. Gentleman. The answer is no.

Mr. Curry: The four cases that I have quoted are not taken entirely at random. They are the four farmers with whom the National Farmers Union invited journalists to discuss their position at the mass lobby of Parliament. Every one of them is substantially better off as a result of the change that we have made.

Mr. Foulkes: Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Curry: Farmers will be paid the HLCAs. The first batch of cheques is ready to go out today. We shall pay as soon as the applications come in. The third instalment of the ewe premium will go out in early April. It will be about £10·50. It will go to 90,000 eligible farmers. So the Government's commitment is clear. Half a billion pounds a year of public support goes to hill farmers.

Mr. Foulkes: Will the Minister give way on that point?

Mr. Curry: The hon. Gentleman should be congratulated on his persistence but not on his success.
We support hill farmers and we are proud to do so. We support the landscape and we are proud to do so. We promote the food which a farmer produces and we seek an ever wider market for it. We are proud to do that. We have husbanded agriculture through an intensely difficult period of change and challenge. We are passionately committed to doing that.
Hill farming is tough; we do not deny that. The conditions are hard, and the rewards are rarely generous, and often meagre. We know that the contribution that farmers make to the community is essential, and we shall sustain them in that role. In this regard, we have kept faith with them, and we shall continue to do so. By their baying tonight, the Opposition have shown that this motion is opportunistic, outrageous and ill-informed. Their concern is simulated, and I urge my hon. Friends to oppose the motion.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: As a great many hon. Members wish to contribute to this debate, I make a plea for short, succinct speeches.

Mr. Martyn Jones: During agriculture questions on 3 December I asked the Minister if he could give an undertaking that the GATT negotiations would not affect support for hill farmers. I received the very comforting answer that those negotiations would not affect HLCA payments. I should have asked the Minister whether he would tamper with HLCA payments, as, two or three weeks later, he announced that he would cut them. This was a bombshell to my farmers, who attempt to make a living in the upland areas of Clwyd. Farmers in those and other severely disadvantaged areas throughout the United Kingdom are trapped by the conditions in which they find themselves. They depend on traditional methods, and have little opportunity to diversify. For years they have been at the bottom of the incomes league table. This has taken its toll on hill farming areas in economic, cultural and social terms.
Farming is absolutely necessary to maintenance of the current condition of the countryside—the state in which the city dweller expects to see it—and to preservation of the fabric of rural areas already eroded by Government policy on the privatisation of bus services and by cuts in education and in council services. The need for hill farms has been recognised by successive Governments and by the European Communities, and the HLCAs go some way towards helping to maintain the upland farmers. But these were cut for the first time ever by the Minister. After my farmers had got over the shock of this unprecedented move, they were astonished—nay, incredulous—to be told

that the cut was justified by some massive rise in incomes that they were supposed to have enjoyed over the pass. 18 months. Such farmers are hardy folk. They may spend most of their working lives on the hilltops by themselves, but they are not stupid. They know that in some cases incomes have improved, but they know also to what levels incomes sank in the previous two years.
The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the Minister of State have acknowledged that incomes have risen from a low base, but they are very coy about describing how low that base has been. In 1991, statistics showed that farm businesses in Wales suffered a net drop in income of more than 25 per cent., to £7,500. Of hill farmers, 45 per cent. are on zero net incomes and a further 40 per cent. have incomes of less than £10,000. In other words, 85 per cent. of all farmers in the less-favoured areas have incomes of £145 or less a week—only 56 per cent. of the average industrial wage.

Mr. Dafydd Wigley: I am sure that the experience of the hon. Gentleman's farmers is the same as that of mine: that about 40 per cent. of them are on family credit schemes. Those are the ones who are eligible. The worry is that the next generation simply will not go into this work unless the recompense is better.

Mr. Jones: I agree entirely. And family credit is means-tested. This tends to give the lie to figures such as those that we have heard from the Minister. We all know that statistics can be used to prove or disprove anything.
I have here a sheaf of letters from my farmers, all of whom are suffering real problems. This is not a joke. It is not spurious or made up. We know that farmers in general have a reputation for crying "Wolf", but this time the farmers in the less-favoured areas of my constituency are indeed badly affected. They are in real trouble. On one clay in Ruthin market I received a petition signed by 150 farmers. Typically, they are facing small cuts—£350 to £500 a year—in income. When their income is so low that that constitutes 10 per cent. of their net income, they are in real trouble.
The use of percentages by the Minister is also misleading. A 50 per cent. reduction in income needs a 100 per cent. increase just to return to the previous position. There has also been a reliance on figures relating to sheep farms. Thanks to the Government's failure to stay within the ERM and the resulting devaluation, sheep farmers have benefited slightly from the devaluation of the green pound. But most LFA farms are sheep and cattle farms and have done considerably worse, and—like the rest of us —they all are facing higher bills for inputs, council tax and so on.
To add insult to injury, most farmers, even some of the least well off, face council tax bills based on being placed in band G, giving a valuation of between £160,000 and £320,000. That is crazy. I would develop the point if there were time, but I am aware that other hon. Members are anxious to speak.
Never have HLCAs been cut. I am not aware of such cuts being made by other member states, so it is hardly surprising that hill farmers feel let down. It is true that the HLCAs represent a compensatory allowance, but they are not, as the Minister implied, a direct compensatory allowance for fluctuations in prices or incomes. If they were, they would have been reduced long ago. They represent compensation for farming in some of the worst


and bleakest farming conditions in northern Europe. Even so, those farms are essential for the maintenance of the rural uplands.
The proposed cut is nothing but a Treasury-inspired money-saving plan because the Government are in desperate financial trouble, in a hole of their own digging, and they expect the most vulnerable farming sector to get them out of it. I urge the Minister to reconsider the cut in HLCAs for the benefit of all who enjoy the countryside and for the culture of rural Wales. He should give the money to those who desperately need it.

Mr. Paul Marland: It is refreshing to note that there is at least one area of agreement between the two sides of the House—that we should seek to keep the rural and difficult areas populated. But am I the only person who is wondering whether there is a limit to which we can ask the taxpayer to contribute when it is possible for hill farmers to get income from other sources? [Interruption.] I shall explain what I mean.
Farmers today are living in a different world. The farm gate mentality is nearly dead. That applies in every sector of farming. No longer can they simply produce goods and get them to the farm gate, and then leave it to someone else. Farmers recognise that they must grow for a market, and that applies even in very difficult areas. A friend of mine farms in the Inner Hebrides, on the Isle of Mull. He is a west highland sheep farmer who has discovered a way to finish his sheep, by changing their diet, in such a way as to fill a niche in the Spanish market. He is making extra money by going after that market.
As David Naish, president of the National Farmers Union, said at the NFU's annual general meeting this week:
Farmers must innovate and differentiate and promote their own products.
We must urge farmers to do that, in whatever part of the country they live. In their turn, the Government must produce sound and sensible economic policies in which farming can flourish, and that they are clearly trying to do. Inflation has dropped from 11 to 1·7 per cent. and interest rates have come down from 15 to 6 per cent. Marketing grants are available to help farmers market their products.
We are witnessing an onslaught on over-regulation and a massive cut in red tape. Opposition Members say that HLCAs have never been cut before and that farmers are working from a very low base. Both statements are correct. But thousands of other businesses in difficult areas are working from a low base. Consider, for example, garages, retail shops and hotels. They are all suffering in what is a world recession. But we do not say that garage proprietors or hoteliers in difficult areas should receive a massive subsidy from the Government to enable them to keep going.
I was pleased to hear my hon. Friend the Minister of State reminding the House that HLCAs are reviewed annually with interested parties. So those who are worried that the reduction in HLCAs is set in concrete for ever need have no worries because they are reviewed annually. This year the currency changes will have a major influence on farm incomes. That view is supported by the most recent edition of Farming News which, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr.

Jopling) and I know, is not a paper that is necessarily well disposed towards the Government. Its leader in this week's issue says:
Currency changes put back a bit of bounce. Sterling's exit from the exchange rate mechanism is putting some bounce back into British agriculture. Seven straight devaluations of the Green £, allied to almost as many cuts in interest rates, have not only taken the sting out of the MacSharry reforms, they have left many of us better off than before … the currency realignments will work similar magic on livestock returns, helping to restore battered confidence there. This week's announcement of an extra 79p on the hill sheep supplement, worth some £10 million, is a case in point.

Mr. Brian Wilson: The hon. Gentleman can read!

Mr. Marland: I can read.
So, for the moment at least, the news is good, and far better than we dared hope only five months ago. Long may it continue so.

Mr. Connarty: I notice in Vacher's that the hon. Gentleman's previous occupation is listed as a farmer and that he owns a farm. If it is so lucrative, why has he got out of farming?

Mr. Marland: I am happy to give way to useful interventions—but what a feckless, useless and unnecessary intervention! My hon. Friend the Minister has given details of the changes in pounds and pence. I am ready to back him. Suffice it to say that hill farmers are getting more money. It is worth mentioning that the total payment per ewe to hill sheep farmers in difficult areas will be £30·92. So a hill sheep farmer with 500 ewes will get a subsidy from the taxpayers of more than £15,000 per annum, and a man with 1,000 ewes will get a subsidy of more than £30,000 a year. As I have said, there is plenty for the sheep farmers but nothing for the garages, the hotels or other businesses in difficult areas.

Mr. Dafis: May I point out to the hon. Gentleman that the shift in emphasis from the HLCA to the annual premium means that the British Treasury will make a substantially reduced contribution, with the weight of the contribution coming from the European Community? Is the hon. Gentleman aware of that, and is he aware too that that means that the Treasury is trying to offload the responsibility on to the European Community?

Mr. Marland: Whether the money comes in theory from the European Community or from the British taxpayers, my point, which I think is supported by my hon. Friends, is that it is still coming from the British taxpayers. We have a duty to look after their interests. Opposition Members may be willing to ignore that duty, as they have done in other cases, but my hon. Friends are not. We are the guardians of the taxpayers' purse, and it is fair and reasonable that we should do everything we can to protect it. How much more do Opposition Members expect the British taxpayers to pay out?
If I did not know as much as I do about the tactics of the Opposition, I would be deeply shocked by what I have heard in the debate. Once again we have an example of Opposition parties seeking to create the maximim misunderstanding and confusion in the minds of sheep farmers. Once again they are seeking to muddy the waters and distort the truth in an effort to pretend to be the


farmers' friend. Not for the Labour party the clear and concise exposition that we have had from my hon. Friend the Minister of State.
When the money starts to flow, farmers will see how much better off they are. When they recognise that farmers are better off, I hope that Opposition Members will have the good manners to come back and apologise to all hon. Members for the disgusting performance which they have put on this morning.

Mr. Paul Tyler: This debate is remarkable both for the Members who are here and for those who are not here. We have had the benefit of the presence of the Leader of the House, the Secretary of State for Defence, the Home Secretary, the Secretary of State for Scotland and the Secretary of State for Wales—but lo and behold, where is the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food? I have some sympathy for the Minister of State, who has had to take his place. Obviously he has been selected to be ducked in the pond.
We must take the figures that have been put before the House with a large pinch of salt. The hon. Member for Gloucestershire, West (Mr. Marland) clearly does not come from an upland area, a less-favoured area, or one of the areas where farmers have been very angry, not merely about what has happened, but about the manner in which it has happened.
I come from an upland area and live among the hills of Bodmin moor. I am not a farmer and do not have to declare that interest, but I am passionately interested in the future health of upland communities. The hill livestock compensatory allowances were originally introduced—and have been maintained by successive Governments—to try to help such communities, and not as a form of income support. They are unrelated to other forms of subsidy. The HLCAs are there to try to ensure that such areas remain working communities and that people can make a realistic living there.
If the hills are to continue to be alive environmentally, economically and socially, the HLCA system has to be in place. That is what has gone wrong and what has caused so much consternation.
The hon. Member for Gloucestershire, West is wrong. No one had to stir the hill farmers into protesting about that outrageous decision—they were stirring us. If he had attended the lobby a couple of weeks ago, he would have found that evident. My Scottish colleagues have received representations from their constituents and from the Scottish National Farmers Union. My Welsh colleagues have received submissions from Wales. Many upland areas happen to be represented by Liberal Democrats.

Mr. John D. Taylor: What about Northern Ireland?

Mr. Tyler: We have not received representations from Northern Ireland, but we would have been pleased to do so. No doubt the right hon. Member for Strangford will speak about that later.
The key issue is where does one start from? The figures for the past few years are immaterial. The Minister's Department has given us figures that show a dramatic drop, of about 75 per cent., in average farm incomes for

the upland areas over the past 10 years. What would the Minister say if his salary level had dropped by three quarters, in real terms, between 1982 and 1992?

Mrs. Margaret Ewing: Perhaps it should have.

Mr. Tyler: The hon. Member may be right. That is the level of the reduction.

Mr. David Nicholson: Will the hon. Member give way?

Mr. Tyler: I shall not, as I know that many hon. Members on both sides of the House wish to enter into the debate and I am trying to be as brief as I can.
The long-term viability of very vulnerable rural communities is at stake and the HLCAs are the only safeguard against those fragile economies being destroyed.
The Farmers Union of Wales has rightly pointed out that
hill farmers have no recourse to alternative enterprises. They are trapped within a restrictive environment and terrain, which will only support hill livestock production.
The hon. Member for Gloucestershire, West mentioned diversification; but clearly he has never been to an upland area. What sort of diversification could there be?

Mr. Marland: I was not talking about diversification; I was simply talking about trying to add value to what the farmer was producing.

Mr. Tyler: I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman has visited Dartmoor, Exmoor, Bodmin moor and the Brecon Beacons. One cannot add value in those terrains. The HLCAs were designed to demonstrate clearly that there are areas of Europe, and not merely of the United Kingdom, that need special support if we are going to maintain a working and environmentally acceptable countryside. A derelict countryside is not acceptable.

Mr. David Nicholson: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way as he mentioned Exmoor in my constituency. When the first announcement about the cut in the HLCAs was made there was great anger among farmers, which affected a number of my hon. Friends who represent hill farming areas. However, since then it has become apparent that there has been a significant increase in the ewe premium, we have felt the full effects of the green pound devaluation and, most recently, thanks partly to my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) and the pressure that he and others have placed on Ministers, we have experienced the 79p supplement. Finally, we had the details of the environmentally sensitive areas which affect Exmoor and other places. Would not the hon. Gentleman agree that all those factors have counterbalanced the initial shock of the HLCA cut?

Mr. Tyler: The hon. Gentleman must recognise that we shall not have a devaluation every year and we shall not be able to cover all the upland areas with ESAs; it is physically impossible. The HLCAs stand alone as a policy that successive Governments have used to support the upland communities. The other factors—many of which affect lowland areas as well—are irrelevant to the decision.

Sir Roger Moate: (rose)—

Mr. Tyler: I shall not give way as I have done so several times and I want to allow time for other hon. Members to speak.
The declared aim of the subsidies was clear. I am sure that hon. Members who have intervened in the debate have read about the purpose of the subsidies, which was
to ensure the continuation of livestock farming, to maintain a viable population in the LFA and to conserve the countryside".
They were not, and have never been, intended as a direct income support system. Therefore, the overall level is of critical importance in maintaining the healthy economy of those areas.
It is extremely important to recognise that the figures that we have been given this evening must be seen against a backdrop of steady decline in recent years. In an answer to a recent question posed by my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Mr. Harvey), the Minister said that, in real terms, the value of the allowance for higher rate sheep in severely disadvantaged areas had fallen by 45 per cent. and for the lower rate, by 60 per cent. since 1980. We are not considering the figures against a pattern of two years of looking slightly better, but against a steady decline over a decade.
When I posed questions to the Minister about farmers' incomes on hill and upland livestock holdings, he demonstrated that they were consistently below that of the earnings of full-time adult manual workers in the country —they continue to be so and they continue to fall relatively. Since 1982, the income of LFA livestock farmers has collapsed by 75 per cent. Therefore, whatever rise now occurs, it will be only a modest upward blip against the depressing trend.
In Scotland the effect is felt even deeper than in the rest of the United Kingdom–98 per cent. of Scottish LFA ewes were in the severely disadvantaged areas in 1992. Therefore, 98 per cent. of the Scottish LFA stock will experience a reduction in HLCAs in 1993—a fall of 12 per cent. in income from an already low base.
We have heard quite a lot this evening about the devaluation of the green pound. What would have happened if there had not been a black Wednesday and a devaluation of the green currency? Would the Minister now be suggesting a major increase in the HLCAs and, if so, by what amount? If he is suggesting that the two are directly and inexplicably linked, we should be told what the figure would be. Unless the Minister is now assuming a continual devaluation—a creeping devaluation—of the pound, the rise is one-off and is irrelevant to the long-term future of these areas.
It is extremely important that we view every calculation as a continuation to the factors that can turn the tide. The tide is not currently being turned in the hill areas. What is especially difficult to understand, given the background of Government support from both major parties, is why the Minister chose now to target the cuts on the hill areas—the most vulnerable of all the disadvantaged groups in farming. The cuts should either be spread equitably across all sectors or they should be targeted at other, less vulnerable areas and less disadvantaged groups, or the benefits of indiscriminate improvement in prices should be narrowed so that help can be concentrated where it is most needed.
The latest announcement of a ewe premium supplement for LFAs, made in the past few days, was obviously helpful; but it is important for the Minister to explain why he intends always to link the ewe premium with HLCAs.

Surely there should be no such direct link. The one cannot simply be substituted for the other. Moreover, that is yet another one-year adjustment. The hill farmers will want to know what is to happen next year.
The most anger and resentment was caused by the lack of consultation. Conservative Members nod: they must be well aware that the way in which the decision was leaked in the farming press, the subsequent announcement just before the Christmas recess and the back-tracking statements that followed it caused immense damage to the reputation of the Minister, his team and the Government as a whole. That is evident from the number of contradictions in the statements that we have heard in the past few days.
Real offence was caused by the lack of consultation. The National Sheep Association—again, not a radical socialist group—said:
It would have given the sheep industry more confidence, and the Government more credibility, if they had consulted more fully with the industry and explained in more detail their change in direction.
The proposal to cut HLCAs is an attempt to undo the good work of successive Governments who have tried to protect and enhance the economic viability of the hills and hill farming. There has been a steady decline in the past 10 years; given the devaluation of the green pound, this was a good opportunity to reverse that trend. We hope that Conservative Members who have been critical of the Government's decision will carry their criticism into the Lobby and that—instead of being present at this late hour simply at the behest of their Whips—they will vote for their hill farmers.

Mr. John Greenway: I think you will recall, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that I first raised this matter on the Floor of the House some nine weeks ago, on the motion for the Christmas Adjournment. I think it significant that, on that occasion, my hon. Friends the Members for Taunton (Mr. Nicholson), for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton) and for Tayside, North (Mr. Walker) spontaneously supported what I had to say. I do not recall much interest being expressed by Opposition Members. I doubt very much that many of them understood what we were talking about, and some of the interventions that we have heard tonight—this applies less to the speeches—suggest that, nine weeks later, not many of them understand it now.
I felt at the time that we could draw three clear conclusions. First, farmers in the uplands were deeply angry and upset by the decision: I said that forcefully at the time. Incomes had shown some improvement, but from a very low base. Secondly, it was clear to me that the HLCA settlement must be part of the overall public expenditure round, in which agriculture generally did extremely well. We all knew, I think, that we were unlikely to get much additional money from the Treasury, if any. We must face the inevitable fact that, when public expenditure is extremely tight, we cannot pick and choose which parts of an overall settlement we like and which we do not.

Mr. Foulkes: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Greenway: No; many other hon. Members wish to speak.
My third conclusion was that something must be done. The position, as it stood nine weeks ago, was not sustainable: in some way, income would have to be made up. Lo and behold, within a week my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food came back from the Farm Council and announced that the EC would help with a 1·5 ecu increase in the rural world supplement. The question of what that was worth was extremely complicated, as was the arithmetic involved in sorting out the effect of the green pound devaluation. My right hon. Friend then suggested that it was worth £1·41 per ewe. I made some inquiries and did some sums. Some weeks ago, I suggested to my right hon. Friend that the total value was understated by about 80p a ewe. It transpired that it was 79p a ewe. I am happy to settle for that.
We have deducted £2·25 for hardy ewes under the HCLA payments and only £1·35 for the less hardy ewes, but both will get £2·20 more as a result of the rural settlement. In addition, as the Minister pointed out, there is a green pound devaluation that will provide a much-needed boost to hill farmers. I look forward to talking to mine again when they get the money. Will the Minister please ensure that they get it on time?
In all the circumstances, we have to accept the position now arrived at for this year. I am tempted to suggest that, had we been in this position nine weeks ago when this first leaked out and the Minister had to make a formal announcement, we might have avoided a lot of fuss, but such a facile view underestimates the difficulty that the ministerial team had in Brussels during the negotiations. Opposition protests are due to their lack of experience in these tough negotiations. We must now concentrate our efforts on the future. I have already said that the payments need to be on time. There is also a need for stability.
Can the Minister confirm that in the case of the rural world supplement, initially proposed by the Council of Farm Ministers to be for one year, the agriculture committee of the European Parliament has reported that, in its view, it should be for two years. That would provide welcome stability. I hope that the Minister will fight for that and get it.
There has also been criticism tonight of the fact that EC funding might not be as advantageous as United Kingdom domestic support. I do not accept that. I have talked at length to my farmers. They seem to think the exact opposite. We have a very tight United Kingdom public spending round. Although I do not underestimate the difficulty of getting money in Brussels for our farmers, the fact remains that there is greater certainty of payment. I accept that the value of sterling is a factor, but all that has to be taken into account in future reviews. Whether it is the HLCA mechanism, or whether it is the rural world supplement, the plain fact is that both mechanisms are income substitution. For that reason, they can be negotiated and agreed only on an annual basis.
I welcome also the fact that the Agriculture Select Committee is to look in detail into this matter. One of the points that I made during the Christmas Adjournment debate was that we needed to get rid of some of the mystery that surrounds the true figures. There should be a much more open review of the hill farm position.
We need also to consider the environmental dimension. Those of us who represent hill farm areas understand just how important hill farming is to the environment. We have some important caveats—particularly that there should be no over-grazing and that we need to conserve the

landscape. That must be worth a price to the farmers. We have environmentally sensitive areas in some hill farm areas. We have the north York moors farm scheme in my constituency. We have the Department of the Environment stewardship scheme. It is time that all this was rationalised so that farmers know just where they stand.
Finally, and above all, it is very much now a case of restoring confidence among hill farmers in the future of hill farming. The events of the past nine weeks demonstrate that, while it is possible to make a lot of hot air and fuss about the issue, it is Conservative Members who have seen fit to take a very close interest in it. That is what we do week in, week out, month in, month out. That is why I believe that we should continue to support the hill farmers. Then they will continue to support us.

Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It must be extremely difficult in the Chair for you tonight. During a very short debate of an hour and a half, it is difficult for the many hon. Members who want to support the hill farmers in this campaign but who have not had the opportunity to make their views known. It is an extremely short debate for a very important matter.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: The Chair does not decide the length of the debate.

Mr. Mallon: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I realise the difficulties that you face, but the measure is much more punitive in Northern Ireland than it is in England, Scotland or Wales because of our agricultural structure. Unfortunately, because the debate is to last only for an hour and a half, no one from Northern Ireland has been able to make that case. I realise that it is not within your competency or ability at this stage to ensure that the case is made, but it is regrettable because of the terrible punitive effect in Northern Ireland.

Mr. William Ross: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It will not have escaped your notice that the measure applies only to Great Britain, not to Northern Ireland. Therefore, if the Opposition would care to table another prayer on a Northern Ireland order tomorrow, we could have a further hour and a half's debate.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The Minister made certain remarks about the statistics pertaining to Northern Ireland, but it should be put on record that the statistics that he gave were misleading and a slander on the hill farmers of Northern Ireland.

Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: Hon. Members will have noted that the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has failed to attend the debate. We are bound to ask whether he intends to vote—perhaps he is still filling envelopes with hill livestock compensatory allowance payments.
We have had an interesting debate, once again characterised by the Government's questionable use of figures. We believe that the Government stand accused of an inexcusable error of judgment only partially offset by the convenient reconsideration of rules, which has enabled Ministers to pull a rabbit out of a hat in the form of an


extra 79p. I am afraid that the House will not be fooled. The Government have sought to justify their original error with a spray of statistics which, when tested, misrepresented the truth. Farmers, the Opposition and a large number of hon. Members rejected them.
Who in their right mind could argue that a 25 per cent. reduction in the ewe price between 1988 and 1992 was in fact an increase, and then have the cheek to suggest that the worst year in living memory in the less-favoured areas be used as a baseline for calculating income growth? Who in their right mind could argue that special sheep annual premium payments offset HLCA cuts, without admitting that SAPs are variable payments which can be reduced as readily as increased? Indeed, we need a guarantee that if SAPs are ever reduced, HLCA payments will be increased to compensate.
Hon. Members have given innumerable examples challenging the Government's statistics on farm incomes. I commissioned some interesting research from the National Farmers Union in Cumbria. We took six farms and analysed incomes from 1983 to 1992. A representative sample of the research showed that in the period studied, on a farm of 500 breeding ewes, where livestock sales remained static in cash terms at just over £11,000, the net profit after subsidy, depreciation and interest on a £5,000 loan rose from £5,000 in 1983 to £7,000 nine years later in 1992. That farmer has been running a charity. No one else could have farmed more efficiently. He was and still is doing society a favour managing that land in the heart of the Lake District. We have exploited his good will.
David Keddie's work at Swansea university confirms that the position is the same in Wales. He shows in his detailed and exhaustive research of 400 households in several regions that farm incomes are miserly and far too dependent on peripheral activity. He shows that the more precarious the income the greater the pressure to increase stock levels. The fear of indebtedness is dominant.
The reality is that, despite all the evidence, the Government have sought repeatedly to hide the truth. The truth was never an argument about offsetting national subsidy with European subsidies and green pound devaluations. It was a decision born in Whitehall to save money on the back of hard-pressed hill farmers.

Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Campbell-Savours: It is not possible this evening.
In evidence of that I quote a letter from the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury dated 6 November 1992 which says:
Cuts in the HLCA rates will inevitably provoke strong criticism from the farming industry. The farming unions have made very clear to us that the industry's confidence will be dealt a severe blow if the recovery of incomes is undermined by Government action. They have pointed out that real hill incomes remain below their levels of a decade ago. And even following the recovery hill farm incomes remain at very low levels in absolute terms.
Then the Minister says:
There is undoubtedly merit in the union's case.
That was a clear admission by the Government of the collapse in hill farm incomes in the United Kingdom. The letter proves that the Government desperately wanted the cuts and they did not care a damn if the hill farmers paid the price.
I come now on a more constructive note to the wider issue of farm incomes. There is, without doubt, throughout the farming community, a developing consensus that farm incomes should not be overdependent on public subsidy. That is the Opposition's view. Farmers have another option open to them and that is to secure a higher price for their products in the market place.
Lamb prices in the United Kingdom at auction are grossly depressed. British lamb is nearly the cheapest in Europe but the retail price of lamb throughout the Commuity is grossly inflated. Dead-weight United Kingdom prices are often half and less what they are in other parts of Europe, particularly in southern Europe.

Miss Emma Nicholson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am sorry, I do not have time. Perhaps the hon. Lady can intervene next week on the Agriculuture Bill.
The explanation is not only to be found in the demand for smaller lambs and seasonal buying, but equally in the nature of a meat trade in Europe which loads the lamb price at retail on the basis of it being a specialist product. Within 200 yards of the European Commission's offices in Rue de la Loi in Brussels three weeks ago, I found lamb being sold at £11.50 a kilo. The United Kingdom dead-weight carcase price on the same day was £1.80 a kilo.
British lamb producers must break the stranglehold of a highly restrictive retail meat distribution network in Europe. That network, in the absence of real competition, is denying the European consumer cheap meat. United Kingdom meat exporters must rise to that challenge. United Kingdom lamb production must become far more market oriented. In a more buoyant market, arguments over subsidy will inevitably recede in importance.
The Government should take a far more hands-on approach to the development of United Kingdom meat exports. Exhibitions and the impressive work of the Meat and Livestock Commission are not enough. We need a meat export strategy which positively carves out a major proportion of EC markets for United Kingdom producers. If we cannot work through the existing retail networks, British multiple meat retailers should expand overseas. The Government can take the lead. The answer to this whole question is to be found not only in public subsidy, but in the wider European market place. In the absence of such a strategy, hill farmers will unfortunately need more and more help. That is why HLCA payments at this time are critically important to their survival.
The whole strategy has to change. Hill farmers need Government help. The Government must take the lead. The disequilibrium in the EC sheep market must be brought to an end.
Tonight's debate has been objective and constructive. Hon. Members of all parties have recognised the difficulties. We all want the industry to survive. In that light, I invite all hon. Members to support our motion. The hill farmers need our support. It will enable Ministers to bring back an order. If we win the motion tonight, that would be the radical, tactical and popular position to take.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: I call Mr. Curry.

Mr. Alex Salmond: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. You have an obligation to protect minorities in the House. You are aware that hill areas are concentrated in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Yet there have been no speakers from Scotland or Northern Ireland. What is more, the Ministers for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have sat silent like stookies throughout the debate. We are about to be misinformed for the second time by the English Minister. This is abuse and I invite your protection and intervention.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman knows that this is a 90-minute debate and that the Chair cannot control the length of speeches. I made a plea and I regret that hon. Members did not totally respond to it.

Mr. Foulkes: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it not the case that the Minister of State can speak only with the permission of the House? He has already spoken and since we have here the Secretary of State for Wales, the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland and the Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, all of whom deal with agriculture, they could adequately reply. I object to the Minister of State speaking again and I do not think that he has the permission of the House.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. May I formally check that the hon. Member is objecting to the Minister of State responding?

Mr. Foulkes: Yes, Sir.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Then the leave of the House is not granted. The debate may continue. I call Mr. Bill Walker. [Interruption.] Order. The House has requested an hon. Member from Scotland to speak and I have called one.

Mr. Bill Walker: Mr. Deputy Speaker, you can be assured that I speak for a part of Scotland that has uplands, mountains, and lots and lots of sheep. There is no doubt that my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) illustrated the humbug and hypocrisy that we often see in the House. [Interruption.] In the debate before Christmas, which I, my hon. Friend and others attended, we noted the absence of all those caring faces that I see tonight. What has brought about the transformation? I believe that it has been brought about because there is a three-line Whip: all these individuals who in the past have shown their enormous interest in the problems of my hill farmers by their absence are here tonight because the Labour party saw an opportunity to put on a three-line Whip. That was in the hope that they could exploit a situation that had developed, as is often the case where negotiations are required in Europe, so that agreements can be made in Europe and payments—

Mr. Llwyd: rose—

Mr. Walker: I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman if he is patient.
They saw an opportunity to exploit it, but they were mistaken, because when they tabled the motion they failed to realise that negotiations were continuing and that figures had been arrived at which were different from what they thought they would be.

Mr. Llwyd: I do not know whether the hon. Member recalls that I am not a member of the Labour party, but it was in response to my question that the Minister made his statement about the HLCAs. We in Plaid Cymru and the SNP are concerned about what is going on and I dare say our Labour colleagues are as well. It is not good enough to say that it is convenient for all of us to worry about it. It is a great worry in the whole of Britain and it is time that the Conservative party grew up.

Mr. Walker: Where was the hon. Gentleman when we took the opportunity to debate this matter late last year? He was not showing his care then.

Miss Emma Nicholson: In support of my hon. Gentleman, does he agree that the Opposition spokesman knew nothing about what he was saying? He was reading from a brief which did not bear any resemblance to reality. He was talking, for example, about the dead carcase weight price of lamb in English markets, and I assume in Scottish markets also, without realising that the point about hill-farmed lamb is that it is exported live and on the hoof, killed in the importing countries, such as Spain and France, and then stamped Spanish or French lamb and sold at a premium price.

Mr. Walker: I thank my hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. One of the great tragedies in the House is that often Members speak who have no background or experience. I do not accuse the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) of that, because I recall standing with him in the Falkland Islands, when we looked out at a sheep farm. The hon. Gentleman said that it could be his constituency and I said that it could be mine, because we both represented hill farm constituencies. So I do not charge the hon. Gentleman with not knowing what is happening in his constituency, because he has always impressed me as knowing that.

Mr. Wilson: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will recall that on many occasions in my six years in the House the issue of HLCAs has been raised at Question Time and during debates by hon. Members who are deeply concerned about the population and agricultural communities in the upland areas. On every one of those occasions there has been cross-party support for the concept of maintaining HLCAs, because everyone who cares about this subject realises that when we start eroding the HLCAs, we are eroding the ability to sustain populations in those areas. Does the hon. Gentleman realise that the only thing that has changed tonight is that Opposition Members are still saying what we have been saying throughout the years and that Conservative Members are having to find reasons to rationalise a complete change of position?

Mr. Walker: I thank the hon. Gentleman, because he is quite right. But—

It being one and a half hours after the motion was entered upon, MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER put the Question, pursuant to Order [12 February].

The House divided: Ayes 245, Noes 283.

Division No. 155]
[1.35 am


AYES


Abbott, Ms Diane
Allen, Graham


Adams, Mrs Irene
Alton, David


Ainger, Nick
Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)


Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)
Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)






Armstrong, Hilary
Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John


Austin-Walker, John
Godman, Dr Norman A.


Barnes, Harry
Godsiff, Roger


Barron, Kevin
Golding, Mrs Llin


Battle, John
Gordon, Mildred


Bayley, Hugh
Graham, Thomas


Beckett, Margaret
Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)


Beggs, Roy
Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)


Beith, Rt Hon A. J.
Grocott, Bruce


Benn, Rt Hon Tony
Gunnell, John


Benton, Joe
Hain, Peter


Bermingham, Gerald
Hall, Mike


Berry, Dr. Roger
Hanson, David


Betts, Clive
Hardy, Peter


Blunkett, David
Harman, Ms Harriet


Boateng, Paul
Harvey, Nick


Boyce, Jimmy
Henderson, Doug


Boyes, Roland
Heppell, John


Bradley, Keith
Hill, Keith (Streatham)


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Hoey, Kate


Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)
Hood, Jimmy


Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)
Howarth, George (Knowsley N)


Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)
Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)


Burden, Richard
Hoyle, Doug


Byers, Stephen
Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)


Callaghan, Jim
Hughes, Simon (Southwark)


Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)
Hume, John


Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)
Hutton, John


Campbell-Savours, D. N.
Ingram, Adam


Canavan, Dennis
Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)


Cann, Jamie
Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)


Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)
Jamieson, David


Chisholm, Malcolm
Johnston, Sir Russell


Clapham, Michael
Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'slde)


Clark, Dr David (South Shields)
Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)


Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)
Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)


Clelland, David
Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)


Clwyd, Mrs Ann
Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)


Coffey, Ann
Jowell, Tessa


Connarty, Michael
Keen, Alan


Cook, Robin (Livingston)
Kennedy, Charles (Ross,C&S)


Corbett, Robin
Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)


Corbyn, Jeremy
Khabra, Piara S.


Cousins, Jim
Kilfoyle, Peter


Cryer, Bob
Kirkwood, Archy


Cummings, John
Lestor, Joan (Eccles)


Cunliffe, Lawrence
Lewis, Terry


Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)
Litherland, Robert


Cunningham, Dr John (C'p'l'nd)
Livingstone, Ken


Dafis, Cynog
Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)


Dalyell, Tam
Llwyd, Elfyn


Darling, Alistair
McAllion, John


Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)
McAvoy, Thomas


Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)
Macdonald, Calum


Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'l)
McFall, John


Denham, John
McGrady, Eddie


Dixon, Don
McKelvey, William


Dobson, Frank
Mackinlay, Andrew


Donohoe, Brian H.
McLeish, Henry


Dowd, Jim
Maclennan, Robert


Dunnachie, Jimmy
McMaster, Gordon


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
McNamara, Kevin


Eagle, Ms Angela
Madden, Max


Eastham, Ken
Mahon, Alice


Etherington, Bill
Mallon, Seamus


Evans, John (St Helens N)
Marek, Dr John


Ewing, Mrs Margaret
Marshall, David (Shettleston)


Fatchett, Derek
Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)


Fisher, Mark
Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)


Flynn, Paul
Martlew, Eric


Foster, Derek (B'p Auckland)
Maxton, John


Foster, Don (Bath)
Meacher, Michael


Foulkes, George
Meale, Alan


Fraser, John
Michael, Alun


Fyfe, Maria
Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)


Galbraith, Sam
Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll Bute)


Galloway, George
Milburn, Alan


Gapes, Mike
Miller, Andrew


Garrett, John
Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)


Gerrard, Neil
Molyneaux, Rt Hon James





Moonie, Dr Lewis
Simpson, Alan


Morgan, Rhodri
Skinner, Dennis


Morley, Elliot
Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)


Morris, Rt Hon A. (Wy'nshawe)
Smith, C. (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)


Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)
Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)


Mowlam, Marjorie
Snape, Peter


Mudie, George
Soley, Clive


Mullin, Chris
Spearing, Nigel


Murphy, Paul
Spellar, John


O'Brien, Michael (N W'kshire)
Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)


O'Brien, William (Normanton)
Steinberg, Gerry


O'Hara, Edward
Stevenson, George


Olner, William
Stott, Roger


O'Neill, Martin
Strang, Dr. Gavin


Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Taylor, Rt Hon John D. (Strgfd)


Paisley, Rev Ian
Taylor, Matthew (Truro)


Pendry, Tom
Tipping, Paddy


Pickthall, Colin
Trimble, David


Pike, Peter L.
Turner, Dennis


Pope, Greg
Tyler, Paul


Powell, Ray (Ogmore)
Wallace, James


Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)
Walley, Joan


Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)
Wardell, Gareth (Gower)


Primarolo, Dawn
Wareing, Robert N


Purchase, Ken
Watson, Mike


Quin, Ms Joyce
Welsh, Andrew


Randall, Stuart
Wicks, Malcolm


Raynsford, Nick
Wigley, Dafydd


Reid, Dr John
Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)


Roche, Mrs. Barbara
Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)


Rogers, Allan
Wilson, Brian


Rooker, Jeff
Winnick, David


Rooney, Terry
Wise, Audrey


Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)
Worthington, Tony


Ross, William (E Londonderry)
Wray, Jimmy


Rowlands, Ted
Wright, Dr Tony


Ruddock, Joan



Salmond, Alex
Tellers for the Ayes:


Sheerman, Barry
Mr. Jack Thompson and


Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Mr. Jon Owen Jones.


Short, Clare



NOES


Adley. Robert
Brooke, Rt Hon Peter


Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)
Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)


Aitken, Jonathan
Browning, Mrs. Angela


Alexander, Richard
Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)


Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)
Budgen, Nicholas


Allason, Rupert (Torbay)
Burns, Simon


Amess, David
Burt, Alistair


Ancram, Michael
Butler, Peter


Arbuthnot, James
Butterfill, John


Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)
Carlisle, John (Luton North)


Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)
Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)


Ashby, David
Carrington, Matthew


Aspinwall, Jack
Carttiss, Michael


Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)
Cash, William


Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)
Channon, Rt Hon Paul


Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)
Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)


Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)
Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ruclif)


Baldry, Tony
Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey


Banks, Matthew (Southport)
Coe, Sebastian


Banks, Robert (Harrogate)
Congdon, David


Bates, Michael
Conway, Derek


Batiste, Spencer
Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)


Bellingham, Henry
Cope, Rt Hon Sir John


Bendall, Vivian
Couchman, James


Beresford, Sir Paul
Cran, James


Bitten, Rt Hon John
Curry, David (Skipton & Rlpon)


Blackburn, Dr John G.
Davies, Quentin (Stamford)


Body, Sir Richard
Day, Stephen


Booth, Hartley
Deva, Nirj Joseph


Boswell, Tim
Devlin, Tim


Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)
Dicks, Terry


Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia
Dorrell, Stephen


Bowden, Andrew
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James


Bowis, John
Dover, Den


Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes
Duncan, Alan


Brazier, Julian
Duncan-Smith, Iain


Bright, Graham
Dunn, Bob






Durant, Sir Anthony
Hughes Robert G.(Harrow W)


Dykes, Hugh
Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)


Eggar, Tim
Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)


Elletson, Harold
Hunter, Andrew


Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)
Jack, Michael


Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)
Jenkin, Bernard


Evans, Roger (Monmouth)
Jessel, Toby


Evennett, David
Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey


Faber, David
Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)


Fabricant, Michael
Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)


Fenner, Dame Peggy
Jopling, Rt Hon Michael


Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)
Kellett-Bowmari, Dame Elaine


Fishburn, Dudley
Key, Robert


Forman, Nigel
Kilfedder, Sir James


Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)
King, Rt Hon Tom


Forth, Eric
Knapman, Roger


Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)
Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)


Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)
Knight, Greg (Derby N)


Freeman, Roger
Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)


French, Douglas
Kynoch, George (Kincardine)


Gale, Roger
Lait, Mrs Jacqui


Gallie, Phil
Lang, Rt Hon Ian


Gardiner, Sir George
Lawrence, Sir Ivan


Garnier, Edward
Legg, Barry


Gill, Christopher
Lennox-Boyd, Mark


Gillan, Cheryl
Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)


Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair
Lidington, David


Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles
Lightbown, David


Gorman, Mrs Teresa
Lilley, Rt Hon Peter


Grant, Sir Anthony (Cambs SW)
Lloyd, Peter (Fareham)


Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)
Lord, Michael


Greenway, John (Ryedale)
Luff, Peter


Grylls, Sir Michael
Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas


Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn
MacKay, Andrew


Hague, William
Maclean, David


Hamilton, Rt Hon Archie (Epsom)
McLoughlin, Patrick


Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)
McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick


Hampson, Dr Keith
Madel, David


Hanley, Jeremy
Maitland, Lady Olga


Hannam, Sir John
Malone, Gerald


Hargreaves, Andrew
Mans, Keith


Harris, David
Marland, Paul


Haselhurst, Alan
Marlow, Tony


Hawkins, Nick
Marshall, John (Hendon S)


Hawksley, Warren
Martin, David (Portsmouth S)


Hayes, Jerry
Mawhinney, Dr Brian


Heald, Oliver
Merchant, Piers


Heathcoat-Amory, David
Milligan, Stephen


Hendry, Charles
Mills, Iain


Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael
Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)


Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.
Mitchell, Sir David (Hants NW)


Hill, James (Southampton Test)
Moate, Sir Roger


Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)
Monro, Sir Hector


Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter
Moss, Malcolm


Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)
Needham, Richard


Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)
Nelson, Anthony





Neubert, Sir Michael
Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John


Newton, Rt Hon Tony
Steen, Anthony


Nicholls, Patrick
Stephen, Michael


Nicholson, David (Taunton)
Stewart, Allan


Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)
Streeter, Gary


Norris, Steve
Sumberg, David


Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley
Sweeney, Walter


Oppenheim, Phillip
Sykes, John


Ottaway, Richard
Tapsell, Sir Peter


Page, Richard
Taylor, Ian (Esher)


Paice, James
Taylor, John M. (Solihull)


Patnick, Irvine
Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)


Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey
Temple-Morris, Peter


Pawsey, James
Thomason, Roy


Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth
Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)


Pickles, Eric
Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)


Porter, Barry (Wirral S)
Thornton, Sir Malcolm


Porter, David (Waveney)
Thurnham, Peter


Portillo, Rt Hon Michael
Townend, John (Bridlington)


Rathbone, Tim
Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)


Redwood, John
Tracey, Richard


Renton, Rt Hon Tim
Tredinnick, David


Richards, Rod
Trend, Michael


Riddick, Graham
Twinn, Dr Ian


Rifkind, Rt Hon. Malcolm
Vaughan, Sir Gerard


Robathan, Andrew
Walden, George


Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn
Walker, Bill (N Tayside)


Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)
Waller, Gary


Robinson, Mark (Somerton)
Ward, John


Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela
Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)


Ryder, Rt Hon Richard
Waterson, Nigel


Sackville, Tom
Watts, John


Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim
Wells, Bowen


Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas
Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John


Shaw, David (Dover)
Whitney, Ray


Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)
Whittingdale, John


Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)
Widdecombe, Ann


Shersby, Michael
Wiggin, Sir Jerry


Sims, Roger
Willetts, David


Skeet, Sir Trevor
Wilshire, David


Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)
Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)


Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)
Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)


Soames, Nicholas
Wolfson, Mark


Speed, Sir Keith
Wood, Timothy


Spencer, Sir Derek
Yeo, Tim


Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)
Young, Sir George (Acton)


Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)



Spink, Dr Robert
Tellers for the Noes:


Spring, Richard
Mr. Sidney Chapman and


Sproat, Iain
Mr. Timothy Kirkhope.


Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

Question accordingly negatived.

Gamston Airfield, Nottinghamshire

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Andrew Mitchell.]

Mr. Richard Alexander: I am glad that at this late hour I am joined by many hon. Friends, and in particular by my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Mr. Mitchell), who is a Nottinghamshire Member.
Gamston airfield is a small, privately owned airfield in the Newark constituency. It is about one and half miles from the major county town of Retford. It is surrounded by several quiet villages, each with 100 or so inhabitants. Since 1967, the airfield has been used for light aircraft on business. No club flying and no tuition was ever permitted. The permitted weight was raised to 5,700 kilos in 1979 and again in 1987 to 12,500 kilos. That was still the weight of a small, twin-engined executive business plane.
In the granting of each consent, Bassetlaw district council made specific reference to the fact that in the district plan for east Bassetlaw, Gamston was designed as a conservation area. Since the increase in permitted weight in 1987, there has been an awareness of some nuisance. However, the limit of flying hours to between 6.30 am and 9 pm Mondays to Fridays, and 8 am to 9 pm Saturdays and Sundays, together with the limit of 10 take-offs and landings, meant that the position was tolerable.
On 29 January last the owner of the airfield applied to the district council to amend the conditions of the 1987 consent. That application was to introduce flight training for professional and private commercial purposes, pleasure flying and charter flights. The weight limit was to be increased to 50,000 kilos—a fourfold increase of the previous limit of a few years past. There were to be an additional 20 aircraft movements a week outside the operational hours. Those hours were to be extended to 10 pm Mondays to Fridays and 9 pm Saturdays and Sundays.
The clear implication to the local residents—I make no personal judgment on it—was that the application paved the way to Gamston becoming a regional airport. The incremental process over the years has certainly given them grounds for believing that. One can understand the anxiety of local residents in not only the village of Gamston but all the surrounding villages and much of the residential area of Retford, over which many of the flights would pass, particularly when descending.
However, my purpose is not to list the arguments why planning permission should or should not be granted; that is not for me and it is not for my hon. Friend the Minister who will reply. I am here to argue that the way in which the application was determined by the local council left a great deal to be desired. I argue that the matter has wider effects beyond the immediate locality.
I alerted the then Secretary of State to the widespread local concern on 5 March 1992. I understand that the local authority received more than 200 letters of objection. The Nottingham office of the Department of the Environment was clearly concerned and alarmed at the extent of those objections. Before the district council could deal with the application the Department issued an article 14 direction. The effect of this was that, although the council could hear the application, it would not implement it, or allow it to be implemented and put into effect, until the direction was withdrawn.
I come now to the first point of grave concern about the handling of this contentious application. On 16 December last the planning sub-committee of the council's development services committee met to consider the application formally. Despite the contentious nature of the application, despite the existence of the article 14 direction, despite the huge local implications of a much larger airport, the council left the matter to a sub-committee. The full committee—let alone the full council, where councillors could have had a proper say and a proper vote—played no part at all. The matter was left to a small group of 10 people, three of whom, including the leader of the council, were ex-offico members.
On the day of decision, following the discussion, all the Retford-based councillors, including members of the majority Labour party, voted against the application. Five councillors—all of them from an area away from Retford: the Worksop area—voted in favour. That meant a tie in the sub-committee. The Worksop-based chairman, who had already voted in favour of the application, used his casting vote, and the matter was passed. What a way, irrevocably and without appeal, to change the face of an area and disrupt the lives of thousands of people for ever.
During the discussion the chairman said that the sub-committee had had the benefit of two expert reports suggesting that there would be no adverse effects if the application were granted. A representative of one of the expert companies sat at the table with the councillors and participated throughout the discussion of the agenda item. The committee knew that Gamston parish council had commissioned another expert report, but that council's expert was refused permission to speak. The parish council chairman was given a few minutes to state his objections. So that decision was reached not only without the full council's having its say but also without the admission of expert evidence that would be contrary to the majority's preconceived conclusion on the application. Half of the sub-committee, therefore, approached the application with totally closed minds.
Immediately this travesty took place I protested to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on 21 December and 4 January, urging that, in view of the way in which the decision had been made, he should not withdraw his article 14 direction. I was saddened and, indeed, astonished to receive on 27 January from the Minister who is to reply tonight a response declining my request, on the ground that the council had obtained specialist advice. I assume that the council had not told my hon. Friend that there was in existence equally eminent specialist advice giving the council a contrary opinion. Did my hon. Friend, when he wrote to me, know of this contrary advice? If so, perhaps he will explain why he did not refer to it in his letter. Legal moves to apply for a judicial review of the decision are already under way, and I do not ask my hon. Friend to make any comment on those. The legal representatives were amazed when they heard that the article 14 direction had been lifted. I hope that the local people will not have to go to the expense of a judicial review and that, at the least, the Minister will explain the grounds on which he took that decision.
I was saddened in reading the Minister's response to note that, because there was already an existing airfield in operation, there was in this case no more than local impact involved. He mentioned that, almost by definition, any airfield activity may be regarded as having more than local impact, and I agree with him.
I stress that my object today is not to list the reasons why planning should or should not be granted. I am drawing attention to the cavalier way in which local objections were dealt with locally and to stress why the matter should proceed to a public inquiry. No environmental impact assessment was called for by the district council before it made its decision. The high-minded intentions of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 ring hollow in the ears of some of my constituents.
The application gives cause for concern over a much wider area than that of the airfield. I remind the House that it would involve a fourfold increase in aircraft weight. It would mean that charter aircraft the size of early versions of the Boeing 737 would be descending rapidly over houses in Retford at below 200 ft., falling to 100 ft. over Ordsall and to almost ground level when passing over the village of Eaton.
The end of the runway is only 200 yds. from the A1, which is shortly to be upgraded to motorway standard. A whole range of permitted flying activity must have adverse effects over a much wider range and area than has been the case previously.
I urge my hon. Friend not to be content to leave this major decision to a sub-committee and the casting vote of its chairman. That is unsatisfactory. I urge the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend to call in the application before it is too late. Let us have a proper public inquiry, with a full environmental impact assessment. No development of such magnitude and importance should occur anywhere without a public inquiry, and, on behalf of my constituents, I urge the Government to ensure that a public inquiry is held in this case.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Tony Baldry): My hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Mr. Alexander) raised issues of concern to his constituents and himself. He dealt with two main issues, and I will deal with both of them.
The first was about the way in which the planning application before the district council was dealt with. The second—they were clearly related issues, according to the way in which he argued them—was that, partly as a consequence of the way in which, he claimed, the district council had dealt with the application and partly for broader reasons, the application should be called in.
I will deal first with the way in which the application was considered by the local planning authority.
If a local planning authority in any way conducts itself not in accord with the law or with its statutory responsibilities, the Secretary of State does not act as a court of appeal. A planning permission which is granted by a local planning authority is a valid planning permission until it is challenged and deemed to be otherwise by the courts.
I appreciate that, because of local controversy, many of the residents who objected to the proposal attended the meeting on 16 December of the planning sub-committee of Bassetlaw district council when the application was formally considered. Subsequently the Secretary of State and the Department received letters complaining about the way in which the meeting was conducted. It was alleged that the chairman was not impartial and that the meeting was not conducted in a democratic manner, especially in

that the council's consultants were allowed to present their views, but the objectors' consultants were denied any opportunity to challenge the basis of their findings or to present contrary views. The use by the chairman of his casting vote, when members were evenly divided over the application, was also criticised.
While I appreciate the concerns of the local people who feel that their views have not been fully and fairly considered, those are not of themselves matters for the Secretary of State to consider. If any person believes that there has been maladministration by the council, that the council has not acted in accordance with its statutory powers, or that other matters warrant further investigation, that person may wish to consider reference to the local ombudsman or to seek judicial review. Either route is available.
My hon. Friend has said that it is possible that some local people will wish to consider judicial review. That is entirely a matter for them to take forward, if they so desire. But it is not for the Secretary of State for the Environment to seek to put himself into the position of the court in those matters.
The second concern of my hon. Friend is that, largely because of local controversy and other concerns, the application ought to be called in. Because of the representations by my hon. Friend and the way in which he argued his case to Ministers, we were aware of local concerns. In addition to the forceful representations made by my hon. Friend, and the objections of large numbers of local people—about 120 objections were received by the Secretary of State requesting that the application be called in—the matter was given careful consideration.
If people feel that their legitimate concerns and interests have not been taken fully into account or, worse, have been ignored by the local planning authority, it is understandable that they turn to the Secretary of State and press him to use his powers under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 to intervene by calling in the application for his own determination.
However, it is important to explain that Parliament has made it clear that planning is essentially a local matter. The Act provides for applications for planning permission to be made to the local planning authority, and for that authority to determine them. Local planning authorities every day have to determine sizeable applications, and often applications which involve local controversy. That is a duty which Parliament has placed upon local planning authorities. The vast majority of applications are dealt with in that way.
About 532,000 applications were made in 1990–91 and the figure for 1991–92 was 511,000. Only 132 were called in in 1990–91 and, in the subsequent year, only 140. That gives some indication to the House of how sparingly the Secretary of State exercises his powers under the Town and Country Planning Act to intervene by calling in applications for his determination. Of those 132 and 140, less than one fortieth of 1 per cent. were called in for determination by him.
My right hon. Friend and I believe that it is wrong to interfere with the jurisdiction of the local planning authority unless it is clearly necessary to do so. Our policy on calling in planning applications, therefore, continues to be very selective. Each case must, of course, be considered on its merits, but my right hon. Friend will generally only call in planning applications if planning issues of more than local importance are involved and if those issues need


to be decided by the Secretary of State, rather than at local level. We have given as examples of cases where call in may be considered those development proposals which could have wide effects beyond their immediate locality, those which give rise to substantial regional or national controversy which may conflict with national policy on important matters, and those where the interests of national security or of foreign Governments are involved.
I assure the House and my hon. Friend that we considered carefully whether to call in the case. The decision not to intervene was taken only after careful consideration of the issues related, as well as all the representations received, including that from my hon. Friend.
Having regard to all the issues, we concluded that the proposed development did not raise planning issues of more than local significance, or issues that needed to be

decided by the Secretary of State, and that it was right to leave the local planning authority to determine the application. The power is exercised by the Secretary of State, and if any party feels that he has not exercised his discretion in accordance with the powers that Parliament has given to him, it is possible for any person who feels aggrieved to seek to refer that matter to the court by way of judicial review.
We have considered the matter extremely carefully. We have already decided not to call in the planning application. As far as Ministers are concerned, that is where the matter rests. If any individual or individuals feel concerned, either about the way in which the local planning authority has determined the planning application, or the way in which the Secretary of State has exercised his statutory powers to decide not to call in the application, those are matters that they will have to refer to the courts.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at eight minutes past Two o'clock.